Tag: fantasy (Page 2 of 2)

A beautiful story about belonging, friendship, and home.

TJ Klune deserves all the accolades this book has received and more.

• A NEW YORK TIMES, USA TODAY, and WASHINGTON POST BESTSELLER
• A 2021 Alex Award winner
• The 2021 RUSA Reading List: Fantasy Winner
• An Indie Next Pick
• One of Publishers Weekly‘s “Most Anticipated Books of Spring 2020”
• One of Book Riot’s “20 Must-Read Feel-Good Fantasies”

Lambda Literary Award-winning author TJ Klune’s bestselling The House in the Cerulean Sea is considered his breakout contemporary fantasy — “1984 meets The Umbrella Academy with a pinch of Douglas Adams thrown in.” (Gail Carriger)

I am happy to read more from this author. The story is cheeky, magical, and funny (yet somber at times).

Linus Baker is a caseworker with DICOMY, the Department in Charge of Magical Youth. Imagine a caseworker who shows up at places like the X-Men school. But then add the layer of ridiculous bureaucracy.

Linus is full of reports. He sits at a small wooden desk, Row L Desk 7, in a room with 26 rows with 14 desks in each row. It’s stifling. No personal items. No talking. The threat of demerits.

Then one day he is summoned to the fifth floor, Extremely Upper Management, and assigned to a highly classified assignment: visit a far-gone orphanage where only the children with the most dangerous powers are kept. Gulp.

Linus meets a female garden gnome, a sprite, a wyvern (winged creature), an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist.

There are so many great moments in this book where Linus is struggling with his interior monologue (all fear based) and what actually needs to come out of his mouth (words of support and encouragement). In the quote below he has been dragged on a forest adventure with the children. The son of Lucifer is in charge today. He’s six.

“Okay,” Lucy said, stopping at the edge of the trees. He turned back toward the group, eyes wide. “As you all know, there is an evil sprite—”

“Hey!” Phee cried.

“Lucy, we don’t call people evil,” Arthur reminded him as Theodore settled on his shoulder. “It isn’t polite.”

Lucy rolled his eyes. “Fine. I take it back. There is a murderous sprite…” He paused, as if waiting for any objections. There were none. Even Phee seemed gleeful. Linus felt the point had been missed entirely, but thought it wise to keep his mouth shut. “A murderous sprite who has a treasure hidden deep in the woods that is ours for the taking. I cannot promise your survival. In fact, most likely even if you make it to the treasure, I will betray you and feed you to the alligators and laugh as they crunch your bones—”

“Lucy,” Arthur said again.

Lucy signed. “It’s my turn to be in charge.” He pouted.

chapter 10

Linus’ job is to report back to Extremely Upper Management on the house manager Arthur and the children’s welfare. He’s to recommend either it stays open or not. What he finds is a home full of magic—the fantasy kind and the kind that’s fostered by love.

This is a fairy tale for adults and any kid wise enough to understand the nuances of prejudice.

Description: Neverwhere is one of NPR’s top 100 science fiction and fantasy books of all time. For good reason. It was published in 1997 and over the years various versions have been produced for tv and radio. But the edition I read is the author’s preferred text. It’s a bit meandering  but certainly makes some of the other versions feel a tad watered down.

The general story is that Richard Mayhew is a young businessman. He’s left Scotland to make his life in London. He’s happened, by chance, into a relationship with Jessica, who is a serious powerhouse and believes she can make him into the man of her dreams. Richard is a drip. En route to a very important dinner, the recently engaged couple have their plans thwarted when they come across a street girl who is badly injured. Richard insists on being a good Samaritan, which pisses off Jessica. She leaves in a huff and later calls off their wedding. This is all inconsequential to Richard who finds himself so deep in shit that a pissed off fiancee is the least of his worries. The girl Richard helps is from the London underworld. She’s undead or whatever would best describe someone who has been alive centuries. And it so happens that she’s being chased by assassins, creepy, creepy assassins. The Marquis de Carabas, Hunter, the girl Door (who is the noblewoman Lady Door), and Richard Mayhew embark on a quest to find who killed Door’s family and who is after her. There’s magic, misgivings, murderers, angels, and a whole world under London that is richer (and smellier) than Richard can even imagine. There’s even a night market held in Harrod’s, but London Below is such a different place than London Above. If Richard is noble enough, he might be able to return to his life. In the meantime, he’s going to die trying, maybe literally.

Favourite Moment: There are a ton of great moments with Richard, and the Marquis de Carabas is one of my favourite characters, but early on there is a little moment that perfectly depicts Jessica.

Jessica stood there on the sidewalk, watching him ruin her big evening, and her eyes stung with tears. After a while he was out of sight, and then, and only then, did she say, loudly and distinctly, as unladylike “Shit,” and fling her handbag as hard as she could onto the ground, hard enough to scatter her mobile phone and her lipstick and her planner and a handful of tampons across the concrete. And then, because there was nothing else to do, she picked them all up and put them back into her handbag and walked back down to the restaurant, to wait for Mr. Stockton.

Later, as she sipped her white wine, she tried to come up with plausible reasons why her fiancé was not with her, and found herself wondering desperately whether or not she could simply claim that Richard was dead.

“It was very sudden,” said Jessica, wistfully, under her breath.

Perfect for fans of … well of Neil Gaiman obviously. But otherwise, if you like radio plays, fantasy, science fiction, bizarre plot twists, Tim Burton, this is for you.