I am liking the Magnus Chase series so far, as much for the characters as for the humor and adventure of the story. The biggest complaint I have about The Hammer of Thor is that there’s a little too much Loki. Loki’s a good villain, but there’s too much of his presence this time around. Watching Loki manipulate things from the background was more interesting than him begin directly involved in the villainy. I also would have liked to see a little more of Sam, but […]
The effects of reading 4 before 1
I accidentally read book 4 of this series (The Secret of Abdu El Yezadi) before book 1, The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack, so my perspective here may be a little out of whack, but oh well. I think a lot of things meant to be surprises or reveals were not because I’d already seen the results. Burton complains briefly of feeling disconnected, and the reason for that gets fully disclosed in the 4th book, so I guess I missed wondering about that too, […]
Chess, Blades, and Now I wait
I liked Stiletto. It had a lot of the great elements from The Rook, with a few new ones. There was action, supernatural weirdness, and snark aplenty. The Checquy and The Grafters are in the middle of negotiating their merge and of course things go wrong and get complicated. Much of the story focuses on 2 new characters, one from each side: Pawn Felicity Clements, and Odette Leliefeld, descendent of the founder of the Grafters. The perspective switches back and forth between the two, which […]
“Ministry of Magic (M.O.M) Classification: XXXXX Known wizard killer / impossible to train or domesticate / or anything Hagrid likes”
First of all, Rowling wrote this book in order to donate the proceedings to charity (specifically, Comic Relief). J.K. Rowling rocks. Also, the book is a lot of fun, which also rocks. And finally, I have a weird thing for Eddie Redmayne, and now I can go see the movie! “Harry: This book belongs to Harry Potter. Ron: Shared by Ron Weasley, because his fell apart. Hermione: Why don’t you buy a new one then? Ron: Write on your own book, Hermione. Hermione: You bought […]
I’m not actually sure O’Malley did much chess research
The Rook is an urban fantasy novel and was The Sword and Laser’s pick for December. It’s been on my TBR pile for a while, so this was the kick I needed to get started, and I found it extremely readable. The plot is paced quickly and the characters likeable. I’m looking forward to reading book two and kind of hoping there are more to come in the series. Myfanwy (rhymes with Tiffany) Thomas opens her eyes in the pouring rain with absolutely no memory […]
A book so sweet you’ll get cavities
This is a very sweet book about acceptance and friendship. Twig Fowler is a 12-year-old girl living in Sidwell, Massachusetts who doesn’t have any friends. That is not by choice, but her mother insists that they not visit other people, because then a reciprocal visit would be expected, and no one is to come to their house. Because they have a secret. The secret is Twig’s brother, James, who no one else knows exists. He is a secret because he has been hit with the […]