Publisher: Del Ray

Combining internet creepypasta x reddit culture with conspiracy theory discussions invoking the Mandela effect, while wrapped up with a premise involving former child stars reuniting under devious circumstances, Mister Magic’s ideas and concepts are nothing short of ingenious. A unique, suspenseful thriller with dashes of horror and paranormal activity, Mister Magic is wildly creative while simultaneously feeling like a personal literary work. Heavily hinged around the theme of lost childhood and the misdirection of parental guidance, there are moments where Kiersten White hits hard with relatable and edgy personal jabs at adulthood that are impressive. Unfortunately for me, those sporadic bursts of genius and excitement are surrounded by a slow and messy narrative that is never quite able to deliver on its hook and ideas on paper. Its ending also devolves into a rushed and convoluted mess. Working at a camping retreat with no cell phone and largely removed from society for the last 30 yrs, former child star Val is unexpectedly reunited with her former co-stars following the death of her father who once grounded and rescued her from a traumatic childhood she cannot remember. Encompassing elements of many popular kids tv shows, Mister Magic’s concept and mysterious disappearance…

What if you stumble across odd coincidences between seemingly unrelated incidents and your brain starts working overtime in the background to try to make sense of these odd occurrences? Random connections abound, that is the concept and world of Terry Miles’s novel Rabbits. Taking place in a realistically and authentically portrayed version of Seattle, Rabbits explores a mysterious hush hush game played in real-time that involves players following strange connections and coincidences that shape and alter the world and reality around them. A self-contained story taking place within the world of a 2017 pseudo-documentary podcast of the same name, no knowledge of the podcast is required to read and understand the novel, though it certainly enhances the read. Conceptually great and full of details and references that will make any internet junkie or video-game geek jump with glee (sorry the pun was too tempting), its actual execution is a bit of a mixed bag and one that many readers may find frustrating or disappointing to read. This is one of those novels that I appreciated the ambition and ideas while finding the actual reading experience less enjoyable. Easily the biggest highlight and strongest element of Rabbits is Terry Miles’s attention…

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries is a curious case of a lot of great ideas implemented in a slow and laborious manner. Incorporating aspects of historical fiction, fantasy, light romance and folklore, the elements were there for what many positive reviewers have describe as a cozy and enchanting read. Unfortunately the narrative and tone was not for me and I alternated between struggling to stay interested in the story and being baffled at seemingly random lurches in unexpected directions. The main highlight for me and the area Heather Fawcett was consistently strong in was the folklore aspect layered into the story. Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries is full of lengthy and detailed stories told by the villagers of Hrafnsvik, encounters with the Fair folk, and even recapped from Emily’s own research. These stories placed in self-contained chapters are often longer than non-folklore chapters given that the story is presented via Emily’s written journal, some entries being extremely short and uneventful. These stories all have some sort of theme that connects to whatever Emily is experiencing at the time, and the imaginative quality of these tales often surpasses the novel’s actual story itself (like modern Grimm fairy tales). The interest within…

The fifth book in Pierce Brown’s Sci-fi epic, this review assumes you have read the previous four books in the series. Spoilers specific to Dark Age will be hidden with spoiler tags, but any content covered in the previous books will not be hidden. Besides, why in the world would you be reading a review for a book in the middle of a long-running series, go read Red Rising first, it’s really good. Now on to the actual review- The 2nd book in what’s considered the 2nd phase of Pierce Brown’s series, Dark Age needed to be solid to maintain the series’ momentum. Despite being an overall great book, I found the previous entry Iron Gold to easily be the weakest and most inconsistent book thus far. I acknowledge that a good portion of its length was required to both bridge the big time jump from Morning Star and to introduce what was perceived to be the new set of main characters. While Iron Gold accomplished what it needed to do, the reading experience for me felt disjointed with its jumping between three different plot threads and the overall direction felt lacking. Picking up after a short time jump, Dark…

I wrote in my review of Morning Star that Pierce Brown had a monumental task then to conclude the staggering uprising premise introduced in his original trilogy in a decisive and satisfying manner. Perhaps an even bigger challenge is to build on the original trilogy’s work and segue the series into its next arc; rebuilding and running a society after it was torn down. As such, Iron Gold had dual purposes to transition the series to a new direction as well as recapture the page-turning intensity that made the first three novels impossible to put down. I consider Iron Gold a resounding success at the former by somehow expanding the solar system society further and using many clever strategies to jumpstart new plot threads. When it comes to the latter however, I found Iron Gold to be competently solid but a bit touch and go with its pacing and reader interest. I was initially hesitant when I started reading Iron Gold, expecting an extended lull and flood of information dumping to bridge the ten years that pass between Morning Star and Iron Gold. I also expected Darrow to experience a shift in priorities or mindset, similar to the beginning of…