The Magicians (The Magicians, #1) by Lev Grossman

Quentin is miserable in the real world, but he’s unsure why. When he is suddenly recruited for a secret school and realizes magic is real, he thinks it will bring him happiness.

“… you will be a magician, Quentin. It is not the obvious career path, I know. … No one will know what you’re doing here. You would be leaving all that behind.” pg 37, ebook

When his training, new friends, and experiences fails to bring Quentin joy, he looks even further into magical theory and stories. What he discovers, the existence of other worlds, is more fascinating and terrifying than he ever could have imagined.

“Most people carry that pain around inside them their whole lives, until they kill the pain by other means, or until it kills them. But you, my friends, you found another way: a way to use the pain. To burn it as fuel, for light and warmth.” pg 216, ebook

This was my second time reading The Magicians. I first read it about ten years ago and loved it then.

It stood up to the test of time for the most part, but I think I enjoyed it more the first time around because of the small reveals written into the story.

“Nobody wanted to admit they were frightened, so they took the only other option, which was to be irritable instead.” pg 298, ebook

I still loved Lev Grossman’s homage to The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. I also loved his magic system.

The magical students all have different strengths and that affects how they are able to use magic to change the world around them.

The worlds Grossman has created are both fascinating and scary to explore. As you move through the book, you have a sense of uneasiness because you have no idea what is going to come next.

And when you juxtapose that feeling with reading The Chronicles of Narnia or the Harry Potter series, this story becomes something else.

Some readers have shared they couldn’t connect with Quentin. He was too moody and unlikeable for them.

I liked Quentin because he feels authentic like someone I could possibly know in the real world. Don’t we all sometimes wish there was more to life than there appears to be on the surface?

Don’t we all wish some of our favorite stories were real?

Highly recommended for fantasy readers. It doesn’t get much better than The Magicians.

Greenmantle by Charles de Lint

In Greenmantle, author Charles de Lint mixes fantasy and the mob and creates something new.

Invisible in the shadows of the side of his house, a small figure stirred. A smile touched her fox-thin features.” pg 67

Ali and her mother, Frankie, recently won the lottery and used the money to move to a house out in the country. Their neighbor, Tony, has a checkered past and has moved out to the country for reasons of his own.

Together, they’ll explore a mysterious force in the woods that is connected to haunting music as well as face threats from a far more earthly menace.

I enjoyed Greenmantle quite a lot.

“Where it passed sleepers, dreams were suddenly filled with resonances never sensed before, while those who were awake, paused in their conversations for that one moment it took for the stag to go by, resuming them again then, knowing they weren’t quite the same, but not knowing why.” pg 100

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The fantasy portions of the story were my favorite. Lint writes them well- making the fantastical seem as if it is actually possible.

Easy to see why he was one of the first writers of the modern urban fantasy genre.

Highly recommended for fantasy readers. Thanks for reading!

Moonheart by Charles de Lint

That was what Sara liked best about Tamson House: that it didn’t seem to be a part of the world outside its walls. Stepping over its threshold was like stepping into a place where everything you knew had to be forgotten to make way for new rules.” pg 25

Moonheart is a story about magic, myth, and how one special house connects it all.

There are many characters in Moonheart, so many that I won’t list them here. But they are easy to keep up with in the story because they are so different.

For as old as this book is (published in 1984), I felt that it had a lot of modern urban fantasy elements to it. Charles de Lint could be considered as one of the creators of that genre.

His story goes from this world, to other worlds, and back again. I enjoyed it a lot.

“There is no such thing as chance in the workings of the world,” he replied, repeating something he’d told her the second time they’d met on the shore. pg 309

That being said, the plot drags in places. This is a book for readers with solid attention spans. I struggled a little to stay interested until the ending, which comes quickly. But once you’re in the ending, you race to finish the book- because it is that good.

Recommended for urban fantasy readers. Thanks for reading!

Battle Ground (The Dresden Files, #17) by Jim Butcher

I saw her study my face and then ask, “How bad does it have to be for you not to be making jokes?” pg 3

The last book in the series, Peace Talks, set up the epic battle for Chicago between the wizard Harry Dresden and his various allies against a relic of the old world and her vassals.

Jim Butcher delivers that battle in a very major way in Battle Ground.

“I hadn’t even seen what was coming for Chicago, and I was already bloodied and exhausted. This was going to be a long night.” pg 17

As per usual, Butcher is heavy on the puns and pop culture references, but I thought he did a fantastic job with this installment. Long-time readers of the series get to enjoy scenes from characters who haven’t made an appearance for awhile.

There are also some serious consequences from this book which, I thought, would have made an epic conclusion to the whole thing. However, Butcher teases more to come at the end of the novel, so I suppose it will continue.

“But whatever happened, after tonight there would be walls coming down between the mortal world and the supernatural one that had stood solidly for centuries. Stars and stones, I didn’t think anyone knew what that might mean.” pg 72

Which I’m not opposed to. You’d think I’d be sick of Harry Dresden and his constant, and ever increasingly powerful, problems. But I’m not. I enjoy this urban fantasy series very much.

Part of that is because of the writing and the characters. Despite the fantasy setting, Butcher manages to make everybody feel very real. I like to imagine that if magic were real, that it would function similarly to how Butcher has crafted it in his books.

The other reason I probably enjoy it so much is because I’m a big nerd. Whenever Harry gets into a bind and makes a cheesy joke to relieve his tension, I always get the feeling that I’d do something similarly silly. When the end of the world is staring you in the face, what else is there to do but smile?

Battle Ground is a must-read for fans of the series. If you haven’t read any of the other books yet, please do yourself a favor and start from the beginning.

Thanks for reading!

Peace Talks (The Dresden Files, #16) by Jim Butcher

Harry Dresden’s life has become infinitely more complicated since the beginning of The Dresden Files. He constantly struggles to balance his responsibilities as a member of the Winter Court, the White Council, and familial concerns.

Not to mention his role as a warden of an island that protects the world from dangerous magical creatures.

“I slung the weighted vest over my shoulder and started trudging back to the car. I had that sinking feeling that things were about to get hectic again.” pg 8

He’s developed a little bit emotionally since his carefree days of “wizard for hire,” but, in other ways, his personality has remained exactly the same.

“…you can’t ignore things that are real just because they’re uncomfortable.” pg 4

The Dresden Files is a fun escape into a fantasy world of magic (one could call it ‘book candy’) but part of the problem with the series is that it has built to a major crescendo. What can one person really do against powers of the universe that are so strong that they can be described as “gods”?

“I think someone you don’t expect is going to stab you in the back, Hoss.” pg 30

Another issue is how often the “winter mantle” takes over Harry’s mind so that he’s constantly thinking about strutting his stuff in front of the opposite sex. I get that it’s a reoccurring problem for him, but it gets repetitive after the first half dozen incidents.

It doesn’t help that he hangs out with a literal queen of the succubus, but I digress. 🙂

Some of my Goodreads friends pointed out that the start of this book is somewhat ridiculous- hanging on the idea that the fairies always repay their debts though readers aren’t given the reason why a debt was needing to be repaid. I agree the setup could have been more carefully constructed.

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That being said, I read the entire book in two days. (Book candy strikes again!) So there’s something very enjoyable about the whole thing even with the balance of power problems, repetitive sexual fantasies, and suspension of belief required to get in to it.

Highly recommended for readers who have enjoyed the previous books in the series or folks who like urban fantasy reads without too much complexity.

Thanks for reading!

The Illumination by Kevin Brockmeier

Humanity suddenly changes as emotional and physical pain begins to shine out of our bodies like light. How would a shift like that change culture? And what does it all mean?

Kevin Brockmeier examines these questions through six different lives that are tied together through a diary filled with love notes from a husband to his wife.

Rarely has a book stuck in my mind like The Illumination. Since putting it down, I’ve found myself thinking about it and asking myself what the author was saying.

“Through the haze of drugs, it seemed to her that the light was not falling over her wound or even infusing it from the inside but radiating through it from another world. She thought that she could live there and be happy.” pg 8, ebook

Throughout the centuries, mystics and others considered “holy” or infused with spirit have been depicted with light shining from their bodies and hands. The ineffable connection to God or gods is shown in the artistic shorthand of light, an illumination in the dark.

In the day-to-day business of living, many of us are too busy with our individual lives to stop a second and ask ourselves, what is the purpose of this experience? It feels so random for the most part. Terrible things happen to good people, good things happen to terrible people. It feels arbitrary and, worst of all, meaningless.

So many are in pain and we can’t possibly heal them all. We don’t acknowledge that. But what if it became so obvious that we couldn’t ignore it.

“The world had changed in the wake of the Illumination. No one could disguise his pain anymore.” pg 29, ebook

The Illumination illustrates another of humanity’s foibles – the tendency to demote the miraculous to the mundane once it becomes a common place experience. Babies are born every day. People die every day. Life in its beginnings, endings, and everything in the middle, is extraordinary but I don’t think we appreciate the enormousness of it unless something unexpected or earth-shattering happens in our own lives.

“He watched with interest as his body was chafed and torn, thinking, Look what’s here inside me. Who ever would have guessed? pg 164, ebook

Maybe, if we truly tried to let it all in, we would all stand around paralyzed by awe.

“It turned out that the world at the end of time was just like the world at the beginning: a single set of footsteps printing the grass, everything lit with its own newness, a brighter and much, much emptier place.” pg 48, ebook

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In this world, the past is reexamined in the wake of the new light-filled reality. Historic photos are doctored to make the pain visible through light. Hospitals develop new protocols to address the change in reality. Communication and politeness take on new meaning as private pain becomes public knowledge.

“For a few months, church attendance spiked. Some of the seats at Fellowship Bible were taken by visitors, some by the Christmas-and-Easter set. It didn’t matter – each new face showed the guilt, fright, or confusion of someone confronted by a game whose rules had suddenly changed.” pg 104, ebook

The dystopian worlds of literature present authors’ various views on what the world would look like at the end of all things. Brockmeier’s world is so very much like ours except for one glaring difference. Perhaps that’s the point. The end of the world is much like today – light or no light, we’re all wandering around seeking meaning and bumping into each other and causing pain, intentional and unintentional.

The spiritual and religious beg for illumination, a shining light through the confusion, a removal of a metaphysical blindfold. But what would we do if those prayers were answered in a concrete way? Probably nothing once the initial shock wore off.

Recommended for readers who seek the answers to unanswerable questions. Some trigger warnings for cutting, self mutilation, and violence.

Cairo by G. Willow Wilson

Cairo is an urban fantasy graphic novel set against the backdrop of the desert city of the same name. It has magical creatures, confused young men, drug dealers, magicians, Israeli soldiers and more.

Everyone in this story is looking for something. If it’s not a magical hookah, it is a search for love, truth, their higher self or more power. I suppose the entire story could be used as a reminder that “wherever you go, there you are”.

“I wanted to do something. Get away from self-obsessed first world crap. I felt like the monoculture was suffocating me. I didn’t want to get stuck where I was. You know that feeling?” “I know it. But I do not think you’ll find what you are looking for in Cairo.” “Why’s that?” “Because a lot of us are stuck here.”

I was drawn to this graphic novel because of the teasers that promised mythology mixed with fantasy. It does contain that, but everything felt so rushed. Readers didn’t get the context of any of it. We’re just thrust into a world that doesn’t make much sense and spend much of the story grasping at straws of understanding.

In a way, it is much like real life. However, I prefer my graphic novels to be more of an exercise in escapism than a mirror for real life.

Give me layered worlds, complex story lines, nuanced characters and deep-seated meaning. I felt Cairo reaching for those things, but not quite getting there.

We do have quite a number of main characters, which, by its nature, makes the story more complex. But, in this case, I felt that more was not better because all of the characters felt so one-note.

The exception to this classification was Shams, the jinn. We get glimpses into his millennias-long life, relationships to other storied characters, guardianship of a sacred object and spiritual leanings. Even then, I wanted more.

“Welcome to your new home, oh jinn. We’ll talk again when you are more reasonable. Take all the time you need.”

The illustrations are done in black and white, and feel rather gritty. I imagine the whole thing could have taken on a completely different character with a couple good punches of color.

My favorite part was when one of the main characters reaches for a hero’s sword in a test of faith. G. Willow Wilson, the author, uses a poem by Hafiz to put words in the hero’s mouth as he strives to touch another reality and lay claim to the magical blade.

“The place where I am right now… was circled on a map for me.”

Though the translation Wilson used varies from the version I am familiar with, which reads: “This place where you are now, God circled on a map for you.”

Still, it is a beautiful sentiment. Rather like the intention, if not execution, of this graphic novel.

Thanks for reading.

Estranged (Estranged, #1) by Ethan M. Aldridge

A cute graphic novel for middle graders that features a changeling, his human counterpart, their human sister and a golem made out of wax.

“There hasn’t been a human in High Court in a century. That makes you special, doesn’t it?” “Oh, they never let me forget that. It’s always ‘the human childe’.”

But trouble brews when a disgruntled elf turns the king and queen of the High Court into rodents. Then, she goes after the “Childe”. In response, he seeks out his changeling twin in the world above or the real world. And that is where our adventure begins.

“The only home I’ve ever had has been taken! This was meant to be my home, my life, and it was taken before I was old enough to remember it!” “I’ve got nothing, nowhere to go! I have as much right to be here as you!”

Along the way, they have to face goblins, magic statues, a witch and a treasure-hungry dragon. The plot is a bit simplistic but it is perfect for children who like fantasy and urban fantasy.

In fact, I picked this book up at the local game shop for my daughter and she read it in one sitting, which is a miracle because she’s a reluctant reader. I’m always looking for stories or formats that appeal to someone who enjoys video games more than books.

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She absolutely loved it and said I HAD to read it. I asked why and she said, “Because it’s just awesome.” She loved the magic and world Ethan Aldridge has created. She also loved the artwork. Her favorite character, and mine, was Whick, the brave wax golem who accompanies the Human Childe from the court below to the world above and back.

The story also touches on the sometimes difficult relationship between a brother and sister. There’s a good message about taking care of your family that I resonated with.

In conclusion, I loved that my Human Childe loved it. Highly recommended.

Thanks for reading!

Hang Wire by Adam Christopher

Hang Wire is an urban fantasy novel with a half dozen characters, some immortal, some every-day people, who come together to face a threat of a magnitude that humanity has never known.

In between flash backs to the villain setting up his ghastly scheme, readers get to follow the trail of a killer in San Francisco who garrotes his victims with thick cable and then hangs them by their necks in a grisly display.

“When the second surge threw him up to the surface, and the third pulled him down, he knew something was wrong. When he surfaced again he could hear it, a moaning, like a deep wind howling through a canyon a million miles away.” pg 10

It’s actually a rather complex plot between the flashbacks and the modern day with nearly constant back and forth skips in time, almost like waves in an ocean.

“You are the master of every situation.” pg 45

Which leads to my main complaint about this book. Similar to other urban fantasies I’ve had the privilege of reading in the past, it felt like the plot either needed to be simplified or fully fleshed out. By zipping over so much in so few pages, I felt like we only got part of the story.

“Of course it had happened before. Several times. San Francisco, like an unfortunate number of other cities across the United States, knew what it was like to have a serial killer in their midst.” pg 47

I guess the lesson I took from Hang Wire is that less is more when it comes to storytelling. And Hawaiian gods of death are incredibly cool.

Recommended for readers who don’t mind multiple flashbacks in their urban fantasy.

Thanks for reading!

The Help Desk Book Blog

Sharing reviews and deep thoughts about life.

Tag: Urban Fantasy

The Magicians (The Magicians, #1) by Lev Grossman

Greenmantle by Charles de Lint

Moonheart by Charles de Lint

Battle Ground (The Dresden Files, #17) by Jim Butcher

Peace Talks (The Dresden Files, #16) by Jim Butcher

The Illumination by Kevin Brockmeier

Cairo by G. Willow Wilson

Estranged (Estranged, #1) by Ethan M. Aldridge

Hang Wire by Adam Christopher

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