Reviews and Comments

This book was kind of a slog for me. Dresden is a chauvinist, and I hate when authors can't keep their religion out of books that are supposed to be fantasy.

People promise me that the Dresden series gets better, but I'm not convinced. Maybe I'll read through people's commentary on the next few books, before I decide I'm done with it.

I read this because it's the Anchorage Reads book for February, 2013.

Parts of it are really bleak--like [b:Caribou Island|8584946|Caribou Island|David Vann|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1279214042s/8584946.jpg|13454259] bleak--and parts of it are rather sweet. It's interesting to me that only part of it seems to stick in most people's minds. Multiple people have said "You really have to read this, it's a sweet story." They never warn you that it's also heart wrenchingly sad.

I feel like I should make an effort to attend a book discussion, now that I've read it. It left me feeling really unsatisfied, but I wonder if that's on me, not on the book.

This book got me interested in the series again. I'm not even sure why... maybe just that the (sometimes really, really dumb) main character realized something the readers have known for ages.

Seriously, it's a series in which some people have magic powers and spend all of their time eating cookies. It's not groundbreaking literature, but it is fuzzy and comfortable, like that ugly sweater you really shouldn't wear outside of the house. :)

I read the first two books of this series when I was at home, sick, unable to do anything else. (I mean, I could have read something else, but these had been recommended as pretty sweet and comforting, which they very much were.) It's a GREAT series for a sick day at home--maybe not if you're sick to your stomach, given how much time the characters spend eating, but if you've got a cold or something, this will help you feel better.

Really, what's not to like? Some people have magic powers. They use them to do cool stuff--not fighting bad guys, or anything like that, just fixing things and making people's days better. There's a strong sense of family and community. There's a lot of ice cream.

It was a pretty big departure from most of my reading, but I liked it.

My book review got WAY too long, sorry. I ended up putting it in my blog: www.sheldon-hess.org/coral/2012/11/book-review-creating-the-customer-driven-academic-library/

This audiobook had a different reader than the others, which threw me off.

In terms of plot and pacing, it was pretty much par for the series, so if you liked all of the others, you'll most likely enjoy this one.