Review: Magyk: Septimus Heap, Book One

There are a lot of books out there angling to be the next Harry Potter, aren't there? That's certainly how the Septimus Heap series was being advertised when I picked up the first volume, Magyk (last year, when the sixth novel was published). There are a few parallels - there's a magical boy and his friends - but not a lot.

The series is about a boy who is the seventh son of the seventh son and therefore has extra special magic powers. His best friend is secretly the heir to the castle, which is ruled by the bad guy. Book 1, Magyk sets up the series and not much else. I felt that, as a stand alone book, it was pretty thin. Maybe this is one of those cases where I'm not the target audience and a middle grade reader would love it. Then again, why should we assume kids need to be talked down to? If I can see the "twist" ending telegraphed from page one, I think my 8-year-old nephew could too. It's not a terrible book - the characters are interesting, the premise is fine - but it certainly doesn't make me want to read the rest of the series.

Review: Melting Stones

I'll confess that I read Melting Stones several weeks ago and then returned it to the library, so my review may be a little non-specific.

Residents on one of the islands south of Emelan have sent a call for help to Winding Circle temple: Their plants and trees and the animals that live around them are mysteriously dying. From Winding Circle come two familiar figures: prickly green mage Rosethorn, whose plant magic will help her decipher what's ailing the plant life, and Briar's former student, the stone mage Evvy. With them comes the eager, nervous Dedicate Initiate Myrrhflower and Luvo, a being best described as a walking, intelligent rock. All are pulled into the island's mystery when Evvy is caught up by the wild spirits loose in an immense bubble of molten rock. Can they evacuate the island in time--or will they try to shift a volcano?

A housekeeping note to begin with: when I wrote my Tamora Pierce wrap-up I thought that Melting Stones was a stand-alone book in Pierce's Circle universe. I think it may actually be a sequel to Street Magic (The Circle Opens, Book 2) or Will Of The Empress, neither of which I've read. So there were a fair number of references to people and events I knew nothing about. I didn't have any trouble following along, though.

While I found Melting Stones to be an enjoyable book, I did find it to be a little young - while it is classified as Young Adult, I think that Middle Grade readers may enjoy it more than a teenager used to the advanced themes present in much of today's YA. Part of that is that Evvy, the main character, felt very young to me, despite the awful circumstances she's lived through.

In general, I think that fans of Pierce's previous Circle books will enjoy Melting Stones, but that it probably isn't strong enough to pull new readers (particularly new older and adult readers) into the series.

Buy Melting Stones in paperback on Amazon now.

Review: The Ear, the Eye and the Arm

Nancy Farmer's The Ear, the Eye and the Arm is a bizarre and interesting novel. Zimbabwe, 2194: when General Matsika's three children wander venture out on their first solo trip outside of their restrictive home, they end up missing - kidnapped, just as the General had feared. So their parents' hire a trio of unusual detectives, the Ear, the Eye, and the Arm, each named for the mutation that gives them special abilities, to find them. The detectives are just one step behind the children, always catching up to them just as they are taken or escape to the next place.

It is a hard book to define - it's mostly science fiction, with traditional folk tales and some fantastical elements mixed in. I can see a lot of different younger readers enjoying this, as it really covers several genres. I found the plot to be a little repetitive, because of this constant cat-and-mouse chase, but I enjoyed getting to see the many different aspects of Farmer's Zimbabwe. Although I didn't feel compelled to pick the book up, when I was reading it, I found it quite engaging.

This book was a Newbery Honor awardee in 1995.

Buy The Ear, the Eye and the Arm on Amazon.

Review: Charmed Life

Charmed Life is the first book in Diana Wynne Jones's Chrestomanci series and the first book I have ever read by her.

Orphans Cat and his sister Gwendolen, a young witch, are summoned to live with at Chrestomanci Castle, home of the powerful enchanter who regulates the use of magic in the parallel worlds and his family. When the Chrestomanci doesn't acknowledge ambitious Gwendolen's talent, she decides to wreck havoc on the castle to make him pay attention. Poor Cat is haplessly dragged alone for the ride.

I know DWJ has legions of fans, but I wasn't really impressed by this book. There were basically no sympathetic characters - Gwendolen is clearly just a shrew, Cat is a patsy, we hardly know Chrestomanci and his wife, their daughter is obnoxious, and their son barely registered as a person. The only person I liked in the book was Janet, and she's not in most of the book. Does Wynn Jones have something against kids? For a kids book, I found the children characters to be really poorly developed. I resented that the female characters were either harpies or doormats, but the male characters didn't fare much better.

As I said, I know this author has a lot of fans. I loved the movie Howl's Moving Castle, so maybe I will seek out the book, but otherwise, I doubt I will pick up another one of Wynn Jones's books again.

Buy Charmed Life on Amazon.

Review: The Lightning Thief

I had never heard of the Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan before the first book in the series, The Lightning Thief was made into a movie earlier this year. I didn't see the movie but I heard good things about the book at the time, so when I saw it on sale on my Nook, I bought it.

This is a really fun middle grade book. I enjoyed reading it - no surprise since I have loved reading myths and legends since I was in middle school myself. Percy is a fun character to spend time with and Riordan does a great job of making the world he inhabits seem believable.

My only quibble with the book is the relationship between Percy's mom and her husband and how that is wrapped up at the end. But otherwise, I though this was a fun book that any young reader would enjoy.

Buy The Lightning Thief: Percy Jackson and the Olympians on Amazon.