Dreadful by Caitlin Rozakis

 

From the blurb:  "It's bad enough waking up in a half-destroyed evil wizard's workshop with no eyebrows, no memories, and no idea how long you have before the Dread Lord Whomever shows up to murder you horribly. It's a lot worse when you realize that Dread Lord Whomever is...you.  Gav isn't really sure how he ended up with a castle full of goblins, or why he has a princess locked in a cell. All he can do is play along with his own evil plan in hopes of getting his memories back before he gets himself killed. But as he realizes that nothing is quite what it seems, Gav will have to answer the hardest question of all--who does he want to be now?"

A few favorite quotes:

• So, this was shock. It seemed terribly inconvenient that the brain's reaction to being placed in mortal jeopardy was to become much stupider. 
• He was a coward, there was no way around it, and he was pretty sure he could live with that. Fundamentally brave people didn't become Dark Wizards.
• He didn't know what that made him, if he wasn't evil enough to be a villain or good enough to be a hero.
• He wasn't a hero. And he'd failed again. But that didn't mean he couldn't keep trying. So he could look himself in the eye, even if no one else would.

My thoughts:  This book is a magical adventure with humor and heart. Gav (formerly known as the Dread Lord Gavrax) knows he's not hero material, but he doesn't want to be a dark wizard any more either. So where does that leave him? Gav is such a great character! I loved his interactions with his scared goblin servants, as well as the banter between him and the spunky and disdainful princess. And seeing him trying to figure out how not to be a dark wizard any more without ending up getting murdered by all the other dark wizards, or all the heroes trying to rescue the princess, was very entertaining. There's just so much to like about this book including a very funny garlic festival and some great magic.  ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Happy Reading!

Foxglove Summer

"The news cycle reset at the top of the hour and I learned that the tiny village of Rushpool in sleepy rural Herefordshire was the center of a massive police search operation for two eleven-year-old girls, best friends, Nicole Lacey and Hannah Marstowe, who had been missing for over forty-eight hours. Neighbors were said to be shocked and time was running out."

SUMMARY:  Peter Grant, police constable and apprentice wizard, is sent to Rushpool from London to see if there's a magical connection to these disappearances. What he finds is traces of vestigia and a few other clues that point him toward the fae. It's not what he was hoping for, because the land of the fae is tricky to navigate. Luckily, his river goddess girlfriend comes to help him try to find the girls and bring them back.

Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch is a fun investigative mystery, although I was expecting there to be a lot more magic than there was. Still, it does have an invisible unicorn in it. And Peter is a great character. I liked his girlfriend, Beverley Brook, too. I just wish I'd read the previous four books in this series before this one so I understood the many references to past characters better. But the mystery itself needed no extra clarification. (Although it could have moved at a slightly faster pace and had a touch more suspense in it.) Still, I'll definitely be reading the other books in this series. In order this time!

Happy Reading!

A favorite fantasy...

The Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia A. McKillip

With her white hair and black eyes, Sybel has a wizard's power that she has inherited from her father along with his white stone house and his collection of mythical creatures. There's the Lyon Gules, Cyren, the white-tusked boar who holds the answers to all riddles but one, blue-eyed Ter, the falcon to wizards and kings, and even the great dragon Gyld. Then one day, when Sybel is just sixteen, Coren of Sirle comes to her lonely house with a baby for her to hide and raise--Tamlorn, the son of a king. And Sybel finds herself drawn into the world of men. Because how can she not love Tam as he grows from boy to man? And then there's Coren of Sirle himself who seems able to look into her soul and see her like no one else ever has.

"I thought of you with your hair of silver as snow all through that cold, slow journey from Sirle. I felt you troubled, deep within me, and there was no other place in the world where I would rather have been than in the cold night, riding to you. When you opened your gates to me, I was home."

5 reasons why I love this book:

• the romance between Sybel and Coren of Sirle
• McKillip's lyrical prose
• Cyren the Boar's wisdom and wry riddles
• all the other mythical, magical animals in Sybel's home
• and did I mention how much I like Coren of Sirle?

Patricia A. McKillip is one of my favorite authors. I never get tired of reading (and rereading) her fantasies. For me, they are all magical reads! She really knows how to create characters that I end up loving. Sybel and Coren are no exception.

Happy Reading!