Faery Snuff Books

Just finished reading Singer of Souls by Adam Stemple. He is the son of Jane Yolen, a noted author of practically everything, but primarily retellings of fairy tales. This is Stemple's first solo book. *shudder*

I'll admit, he is a good writer. The writing was sharp and interesting: not too much detail, not too little. Character development was very good for the main character, though a little shallow for the secondaries (which is pretty typical). I truly enjoyed the first three-quarters of the book...and then the joy ended.

The plot, without giving too much away, revolves around Douglas, a recovering heroin addict. Douglas is from Minneapolis and decides to move to Scotland to live with his grandmother as a means of getting away from his old junkie life. Douglas is a singer and busks on street corners as a way of making his money. His one hook is that he has the ability to write songs for people (a "theme" song) within a few minutes of meeting them and after asking them only a few questions about themselves. He does a good business in Edinburgh until he meets Aine, a faery queen who asks him to write a song for her. In exchange, she gives him a vial of powder. Assuming it is drugs, he avoids it for awhile but eventually caves in to temptation and shoots it into his system. Unfortunately for Douglas, the vial was not drugs, but a potion that imbues him with the power of "the sight" - the ability to see faeries.

I'm a fan of urban fantasy and I'm used to the runaway junkie storyline. It is usually pretty stark and a little disturbing, but a really good writer can usually temper the disturbing images with dark humour and a light touch. In my opinion, Stemple didn't pull it off. The story was really interesting, but it got really violent...and the violence was pointless. Yes, I do think there is violence that has a point in books (re: the graphic novel of The Crow), but that's another story. The ending was bloody, horrific, disturbing...and it fell flat. It was like one of those bad horror movies where you're standing there at the end saying, "that was it?"

I don't recommend this book. It left me feeling disappointed. If the ending can't be happy and if the ending can't provide resolution, it should at least be thought-provoking. This was not. If you want a similar storyline, but want to read something good, check out Holly Black's Valiant.

Happy Reading!

Septimus Heap Book I: Magyk

Man, I don't know what's wrong with me, but lately I've been so critical of the books I read. And normally I'm very forgiving. I don't know if it's the mood I'm in, or if I've just gotten more sensitive, but lately everything I read is crap! I just keep thinking, did they have an editor? Did the author even read the book after they were done writing it? My cat could've written a better book than this!

So, after that little rant, I must admit that what I just said doesn't actually apply to Septimus Heap. Or, not really, anyway. Cuz I actually enjoyed the book. I do have a few criticisms, however. I thought that there were a few holes in the plot, some plot lines or characters that could have been developed more fully, and a couple of characters which were just extraneous (y'all know what a fan I am of tight plots). And the biggest flaw was that the author just didn't do a good job of explaining how the magic works. I mean, I know it's magic, and it doesn't have to follow any known laws of the physical universe. But, in fantasy worlds, magic usually does have rules which must be followed and make sense within that world. The author tried several times to explain how it worked, and I was still like, Huh? And non-wizards seem to be able to perform spells, so what's the point of being a wizard??? I dunno. There is another book in the series so maybe that will explain some of the discrepancies.

But, like I said, although the afore-mentioned inconsistencies occasionally annoyed me, on the whole I still liked the book. And I stayed up until 2 in the morning to finish it, so they must've done something right, right?