Ella Minnow Pea: a Novel in Letters - Mark Dunn

3.5/5

 "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." a well known pan-gram and words to live by for the people of the island of Nollop.  At letters fall from the statue in town, so too do they fall from the vocabulary of the citizens, or else.  

What at first seems a simple challenge quickly accelerates into social disaster in this commentary on censorship, society, and the role of government. 

A quick read and at the beginning a light one with a dynamic feel as letters and townspeople fall victim to their crumbling adage.

Dr. Sleep - Stephen King

4/5

If you liked The Shining, you'll like this one too.  A true sequel even after so many years in between (both in book and out of it). There's plenty familiar but not so much so that it takes anything away at all from the scare factor.  This book delves deeper into the mystery of shining somehow without explaining a thing about it.  Instead of being frustrating this just adds to the wonder.  Also we see an interesting mix of old horrors and new ones that are just as creepy if not more so.  The feel is still very much the same as The Shining but perhaps a bit older which makes perfect sense once you pick this one up.

Grimus - Salman Rushdie

5/5

I tend not to give 5's unless a book is really special.  This one is really special.  The sense of magic is both natural and unreal.  You don't bat an eye as reality morphs into something on the edge of comprehension.  Like most of Rushdie's work there is also an interwoven commentary about society as a whole, life, death, the comprehension and refusal thereof.  It feels like stepping into a fairy tale, but a grown up fairy tale with the light escaping the world feel of good fantasy and simultaneously the real weight of life and it's unanswerable questions mixed in.

The Glass Magician - Charlie N. Holmberg

4/5

This sequel to The Paper Magician (see prior post) started out on a bit of a different flavor.  It seemed like more of a romance which, while surprising, was not bad.  It continued that way for a while, then the action starts. And once it starts it does not stop.  I usually dislike when a book switches characters between chapters but it is done skillfully to build suspense here.  There are some shocking developments with major implications to the entire story world that makes it almost impossible to not pick up the third book as well.

Black House -Stephen King & Peter Straub

3/5 overall 4/5 in places

The combination of these two authors is fascinating, there is a clear set of typical King characters and setting but the voice is different.  This book is a brick weighting in at over 800 pages.  The pacing is also a bit slow at the beginning,  those familiar with long King stories won't find this entirely unfamiliar but it is a commitment.  It was quite well written and some of the characters are excellent. It's a good book for leaving on your night stand and attacking in little chunks.  That being said it's a little too easy to set down right in the middle of the action.  There are multiple worlds in this book and they certainly feel different almost as if they could be from two seperate books, I'm not sure if I think this is skilled or disconcerting.  Overall a good read but definitely not one to start if you're not ready for a long haul.

Mayhem at the Orient Express - Kylie Logan

4/5

This is my first real delve in to the cozy mystery genre, and I have to say this was a lot of fun.  A very nice light read.  The ladies of the book club at the center of the mysteries keep up a sitcom-esque banter which had me smirking at my book more than once. The story mirrors the classic which it is named after but with enough quirks to make it not quite a parody but familiar and yet new.  I'd recommend this book to anyone looking for something light and amusing, particularly ladies who, I think, will find the interactions of the group quite familiar.

The Paper Magician - Charlie N. Holmberg

4/5

What girl hasn't had a crush on a young attractive teacher.  Now what if that teacher just happened to be a teacher of magic.  Surely this is not just going to be a normal class.  This delightful YA novel has a fantastically relatable main character and the magic is both familiar and phenomenal without being extreme.  In many places I had the thoughts of "hey I remember those!" as well as "oh it would be so cool to be able to do that" (hint: this one relates to books).  This book just whisks you right along, though I do feel the middle bit drags juuuust a bit long.  Though that may have been skill on the authors part because just as I was getting to "okay this part can be over now" within pages, it ended.  This is a book about people not magic but with enough magic to flourish in the imagination.