Review: Across the Great Barrier

Across the Great Barrier (Frontier Magic Book 2)
Patricia C Wrede
339 Pages

Eff is riding west, away from the safety of the frontier city she's always known.... 

Eff could be a powerful magician if she wanted to. Except she's not sure she wants that kind of responsibility. Everyone keeps waiting for her to do something amazing--or to fail in a spectacular way. Worse, her twin brother, Lan, a powerful double seventh son, is jealous of all the attention she's been getting.

Even as Eff protests that she's just an ordinary girl, she's asked to travel past the Barrier Spell with one of the new professors at her father's school. The land west of the Barrier is full of dangers, both magical and wild. Eff will need to use all her strength--magical and otherwise--to come safely back home.
-description taken from goodreads

This review contains no spoilers for this book or the first in the series.

There's an unfortunate trend in trilogies called "The Second Book Slump". Unlike the first installment where the world and characters are fun and new, the second book is often drier and just a stepping stone for the author to get to the finale. Although an experienced author, Wrede falls into this trap with her second in the Frontier Magic series.

For those who haven't read the first in the series (The Thirteenth Child), Patricia Wrede sets up a unique, alternate history of post civil war America where magic is taught in universities and western expansion means contending with dangers such as steam dragons. It's a fantastic world, but the novelty of it wears off  after one volume. In this one I wanted to learn more about Eff, the protagonist who, although possessing a great talent for magic, has had the stigma of being an unlucky thirteenth child following her all her life. Instead of this, I had to sit through about two hundred pages of Wrede listing off various magical plants and animals. There wasn't any real development at all, and all the main action was cornered off into the last quarter.

Although there were parts that should've been suspenseful, but because I had no reason to care about the characters I couldn't get invested in their problems. Reading this book was like drinking a flat soda; there was still some flavor, but all of the fun bubbles from earlier had fizzled out.

I will pick up the final installment, which comes out this August, eventually. I do believe in Wrede's skills as an author, and it's clear from the hints dropped throughout this volume that she's planning something big. 

Review: Everlasting

Title: Everlasting
Author: Angie Frazier
Pages: 329

“Sailing aboard her father’s trade ship is all seventeen-year old Camille Rowen has ever wanted. But as a girl of society in 1855 San Francisco, her future is set: Marry a man she doesn’t love, or condemn herself and her father to poverty.

On her final voyage before the wedding, the stormy arms of the Tasman Sea claim her father, and a terrible family secret is revealed. A secret intertwined with a fabled map, the mother Camille has long believed dead, and an ancient stone that wields a dangerous –and alluring- magic.

The only person Camille can depend on is Oscar, a handsome young sailor whom she is undeniably drawn to. Torn between trusting her instincts and keeping her promises to her father, Camille embarks on a perilous quest into the Australian wilderness to find the enchanted stone. As she and Oscar elude murderous bushrangers and unravel Camille’s father’s lies, they come closer to making the ultimate decision of who –and what- matters most.”

~description taken from book jacket

Everlasting is an example of one of those books that are perfectly nice and enjoyable, but overall lack that intangible “it factor” that makes it memorable.

Camille, the heroine, is fun to read about, but just doesn’t stand out from the hoards of other YA protagonists. It’s not that she’s annoying or I had any problems with her- she was just generic, making it nearly impossible to empathize with her. The same can be said for Oscar, the man she loves. He’s perfectly nice and attractive, but forgettable. I only finished Everlasting last night, but I’m already having difficulty trying to scrounge up details about his personality. Because I can’t bring myself to care about either of the two, the romantic aspect of the book (which is quite large) falls flat.

Another problem I have regarding characters is Ira- the ‘funny sidekick’ as China Mieville would put it. He is by far my favorite in the novel, but is eerily similar to Captain Jack Sparrow of Pirates of the Caribbean. I don’t want to throw around the word plagiarism lightly, but there are enough similarities between the two to be concerned about. They’re both criminals, have an affinity for wenches, mention alcohol –specifically rum- multiple times, use the exact same wording and phrases, and overall possess the same general attitude. The only real difference is that Ira isn’t as developed as thoroughly.

Similar to how the romance feels lackluster, the plot is equally unenthralling for the same reason: I couldn’t care about the characters and therefore couldn’t be concerned about what happened to them. This is a bit sad since the events of the novel are actually put together quite well- everything works and remains within the suspense of disbelief. It’s for this reason that I’m annoyed at the unsubtle hints of a sequel near the ending. I think it would be more beneficial for Miss. Frazier to drop the characters, take it as a loss and move onto a different storyline.

Ultimately, there’s not much that’s technically wrong with Everlasting, but there’s not much right about it either. It is a fun, light read and I did finish it to the end. However, I cannot actively recommend it since there are so many other, better books out there. One example is Juliet Marillier’s Cybele’s Secret. It also features a seafaring romance and a search for a magical artifact, but features that ever illusive “it factor”. I’d recommend picking that up instead of Everlasting.

Grade: 3/5

Review: Artemis Fowl: The Atlantis Complex

Artemis Fowl: The Atlantis Complex
Eoin Colfer

“Artemis has committed his entire fortune to a project he believes will save the planet and its inhabitants, both human and fairy. Can it be true? This goodness taken hold of the world’s greatest teenage criminal mastermind?


Captain Holly Short is unconvinced and discovers that Artemis is suffering from Atlantis Complex, a psychosis common in guilt-ridden fairies, not humans, and most likely triggered in Artemis by his dabbling in fairy magic. Symptoms include obsessive-compulsive behavior, paranoia, multiple personality disorder and, in extreme cases, embarrassing confessions of love to a certain feisty LEPrecon fairy.


Unfortunately, Atlantis Complex has struck at the worst possible time, A deadly foe from Holly’s past is intent on destroying the actual city if Atlantis, Can Artemis escape the confines of his mind- and the grips of a giant squid- in time to save the underwater metropolis and its fairy inhabitants?”

~Description taken from jacket cover

I’ve been reading the Artemis Fowl books since the first one was published a decade ago. Its one of the select few childhood series I’m determined to see through to the end, proving that it isn’t limited to the age 9-12 audience. Given this background, I’ve been waiting anxiously for The Atlantis Complex since I heard it was coming out six months ago. It’s because of this build up of excitement that made me so disappointed in this installment, and makes this review somewhat painful to write.

One of the many reasons I’m completely enamored with Eoin Colfer as a writer is because of his superior sense of pacing and suspense. In previous books, he’s put Artemis and Holly in such desperate situations that, even though you know in the back of your mind they’ll survive, you still can’t put the book down. Half of this is because the passages are so well-written, and the other half is waiting to see how Artemis will figure a way out of the bind. There’s no comparable scenario in The Atlantis Complex. For instance, the book jacket mentions a scene in which a giant squid takes hold of Artemis, promising to be an enthralling bit. In reality, it’s short, poorly executed, and Artemis is rescued by a deus-ex-machina rather than one of his own plans. All I could think was “Colfer’s done this before and he’s done it better.”

However, this plot rehashing is most annoying when he places in a random character death in the first fifty pages and parallels it to Commander Root’s. When Root was killed in The Opal Deception I actually cried, which rarely happens when I read a book. The death in The Atlantis Complex, on the other hand, seemed random and included solely out of convenience or that he didn’t know what to do with the character. I find this so perturbing because Colfer has proven himself to be a better author than to have to rely on such an amateur trick as this.

This isn’t to say that there was nothing redeeming about The Atlantis Complex. Orion, Artemis’ ‘other’ personality, is one of my favorite characters simply because he’s so ridiculous. He incessantly professes his love to Holly, much to Artemis’ chagrin and can’t stop citing romantic poetry. He’s also, in my opinion, the center of one of the best comic moments in the series (it involves the mention of a birthmark, but I won’t say more than that). I’d really like him to show up in the next book, if possible.

There’s a huge amount of unsubtle hints to the next, and reportedly last, book in the series. Mostly, the constant references to Opal Koboi, but also the tense romance between Holly and Artemis. It makes me wish that Colfer had skipped over The Atlantis Complex entirely, and just written one final, excellent book. It would have fit in better with an otherwise stellar series.

Grade: 3/5 Stars

Note: Although this review is harsh, I remain by my opinion that Eoin Colfer is an amazing author. Including The Atlantis Complex I’ve read eleven books by him, and this is the only one I wouldn’t highly recommend.

Academy 7 by Anne Osterlund

“Aerin Renning is a scarred fugitive, Dane Madousin a rebellious son of privilege. On the surface, they have nothing in common. But the two most competitive freshmen at Academy 7 share an undiscovered bond. Both harbor a dangerous secret that threatens their own destruction. And while their safety depends on their staying apart, the two are inexplicably drawn to each other. Even as unknown forces conspire to separate them, their competition turns to friendship, and their friendship to romance. Now not only their lives—but their hearts—are at stake. To survive, the two must unite all their knowledge, skills, and gifts to uncover a secret bigger than either could have imagined. A secret as big as the entire universe...”

~Description taken from Goodreads

I’m going to start off by saying that I’m prejudiced against sci-fi novels. I don’t really know why, considering I’ve never had a bad experience with one. I guess I just don’t like the “idea” of them. In any case, if I had known Academy 7 was sci-fi I would have never picked it up. I’m glad I didn’t, because it really was a pleasure reading it.

Academy 7 is split between the perspectives of Aerin and Dane, two incredibly intelligent students who come from two very different backgrounds. Aerin is an escapee slave from the planet Vizhan and must hide her past in order to keep her place at the academy. As a reader I immediately bonded with her and couldn’t wait for the passages with her narrative to come up.

Unfortunately, I can’t say I felt the same connection with Dane. Although the two characters are represented equally in word count, the emotional impact behind them is not at all the same. You find out early on that Dane has suffered abuse from his father, but the author never allows you to truly empathize with him. It’s like there’s a wall between the reader and Dane that just doesn’t exist for Aerin. Given how easy it is to care for Aerin, I think it might just be that the author is inexperienced in fleshing out male characters.

The novel itself is fast moving -I plowed through it in a couple of hours- and the plot itself is built well. The information how Aerein and Dane are connected through their parents is revealed at an appropriate rate, although I was never truly anxious to read more. Academy 7 is a quick, pleasant read and I’d recommend it to someone who’s looking for some light summer reading.
Grade: 3/5