wizards – Page 6 – Cannonball Read 17

Beginning of the end, in which a series redeems itself

Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Legends by Lydia Sherrer

February 25, 2019 by CoffeeShopReader Leave a Comment

I’ve almost got my ‘started before 2019 began’ pile cleared out. This is the first of the final four: Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Legends. This book was a bit of a surprise in a few ways, most of them good. This was book 4 in a series I was starting to get annoyed with. Some structural patterns and a seriously pet-peeving plot development cliché seemed to be developing. I was ready to give up. I’ve mentioned the structure in reviews of previous volumes, but […]

Family Matters and Magic

August 5, 2018 by CoffeeShopReader Leave a Comment

This is effectively one review for two books because really, it should be one book, not two. Let it be known I find these entertaining easy reads, but there are some structural and character problems that are really starting to annoy me. 3.5 stars combined. The continuation of gradually revealing more about the world really develops in Revelations, along with what is pretty obviously the main conflict of the series: villainous wizard want to discover ‘wizarding’ gene and use this information to find and wake […]

My favorite not my favorite

January 29, 2017 by CoffeeShopReader Leave a Comment

Terry Pratchett is one of my favorite authors of all time. I’ve read the Discworld series in its entirety and several of Pratchett’s other works as well. When he passed away in March 2015, the literary world lost one of the contemporary greats, but it seems he left a lot of unpublished things or just works in progress or to be collected. I was looking forward to Dragon’s at Crumbling Castle and Other Stories, which is a collection of juvenalia fiction. Some of the stories […]

Yet another reason CBR was the best New Year’s resolution I ever made.

August 21, 2016 by Blingle Bells 1 Comment

(Kinda spoilers throughout but I feel like everyone here has already read this.) I made a deal with myself while reading everyone’s CBR reviews last year that if I was persuaded by a review, I’d add it to my Goodreads list and give it a shot even if I later couldn’t imagine why I’d wanted to read it. I did this because I was reading a lot of reviews for things way outside my usual genres and I knew I’d get around to them and […]

Bad Harry Potter goes to Narnia Hell Makes for Creepy Dirty Bad Reading

February 14, 2016 by CoffeeShopReader 8 Comments

I was intrigued by the first third of The Magicians, hated the second third, and the final third was weird and I’m not sure it was enough to redeem the book from the middle part. The first part is dark Harry Potter, the second is existential and dirty in a creepy-bad way, and the last is Narnia gone to hell. Overall, The Magicians reminded me of The Secret History (which I liked parts of but overall didn’t like for many of the same reasons I […]

Not everything can be “Attachments”

December 3, 2015 by alwaysanswerb 17 Comments

This is going to be one of those reviews where even giving it four stars feels like I may as well be panning it, because I didn’t instantly want to elope forever with Carry On unlike, it seems, freaking everyone else. And because everyone has already expounded at length as to why they love it, I can’t really add anything new to that end. So here we are — a four-star review full of gripes. Mea culpa. But really, this book was really good! And […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

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