Off the Bookshelf: NEVERWHERE, by Neil Gaiman

Audiobook

This is the second audiobook by Neil Gaiman in my collection, and I can see spending the rest of my Audible credits just on MORE.

Read by the author. I really think you get a lot more out of a book when it's read by the author, because the author knows the rhythm, the pace, the way the different characters should sound. It adds so much to the experience. And yeah, part of it is the accent ...

NEVERWHERE takes place in London, and underneath London, and there's some slipping through dimensions, and magic, and legend and ... I am in awe, okay? I want to write like him when I grow up.

My first taste of Gaiman's writing was when people were talking about THE GRAVEYARD BOOK. It was essentially THE JUNGLE BOOK, but instead of wolves, the baby is saved and raised by ghosts. So when I saw STARDUST in the Audible listing, I was sure I was in for a listening treat. NEVERWHERE just seals that certainty.

Richard Mayhew is one of those nice guys who are succeeding, but not really happy with their comfortable, secure lives. He has a fiance who is trying to improve him, and a job that just doesn't feed his soul. Then one day Door, an injured girl, lands on the sidewalk in front of him. Instead of stepping around her, Richard stops to help. His life doesn't just crumble from that point, it is taken away. Richard becomes one of those people who falls through the cracks, becomes essentially invisible -- he is tossed without warning into the world of London Below. He travels and takes risks and makes stupid mistakes when he doesn't learn quickly enough, and nearly gets himself killed, in his quest to get his life back.

This is one of those books where I created excuses to get in the car or do chores, so I could keep listening! What happens next? I NEED to know! Even as I'm cringing for the characters in some and spots and cheering in others and groaning in others. NEED to know, even as I'm sure it's not going to be pleasant.

THAT is the mark of a master storyteller. Lovely experience. More, please?

Off the Bookshelf: WRITING ABOUT MAGIC, by Rayne Hall

Very useful research and resource book for those who are writing in the fantasy genre.

Organized into topics that need to be considered -- and sometimes I suspect that writers don't consider, don't plan out, they just figure they'll wing it and make up their magic system as they go.

Or what's worse, they don't realize they NEED a system, they need to establish rules, before they start writing. When they come up against a problem in the story, they just throw magic at it.

And as the author points out, what's more boring than being able to fix every single problem with magic?  So you have to have limitations and consequences and rules and conflicts and barriers and ... Yeah, writing is a lot of work, but it's also dang fun!

Chapter Titles: Magician Characters; Magic Systems; Training and Initiation; Ritual and Power-Raising; Location and Circle-Casting; Costuming and Equipment; Phrasing the Spell; Correspondences; Love Spells; Sex Magic; Magical Weapons and Warfare; Healing and Protection; Ethics, Conflicts and Secrecy; Illusionists and Charlatans; Magic in the Future.

Plus the author gives exercises to make you think, and assist you in using what you've just learned, and lists of books on the topics, for further reading and research. There's a LOT of useful information packed into the book. Well worth the money and time. I can predict going back to this one a LOT when I do worldbuilding.

Off the Bookshelf: TWISTED TWENTY-SIX, by Janet Evanovich

The latest Stephanie Plum misadventure of suspense and humor and wackiness and near-misses.

This time, Grandma Mazur isn't just causing trouble on the sidelines -- she IS the center of the trouble that poor Stephanie has to untangle.

Grandma ran off with a retired mobster and eloped on a cruise -- and 45 minutes later he died of a heart attack. Now, his nutso-nasty sisters are after Grandma, determined to get his money -- his ex-wife is after the money -- and his pals think the dead groom handed off some very valuable keys (no one says to WHAT exactly) to Grandma before he died. Of course, Grandma doesn't know anything about keys -- she's just planning all the fun things she's going to do with the money, once the will is read.

If she ever survives to hear the reading of the will. Because everybody wants those keys, and everything thinks Grandma has them. And the mobsters, even the retired ones in Trenton, are pretty determined and nasty folks. We're talking windows broken, fire bombs thrown through front windows, house break-ins and searches, attempted kidnappings, Stephanie getting shot ... on and on.

Typical Stephanie Plum craziness. Along with a bunch of wacko bail jumpers she has to deal with, aided by Lula with her plus-sized sense of humor shoved into a size 8 eye-popping wardrobe. Poor Stephanie is ready to quit the whole thing -- only she still doesn't know what she wants to do when she grows up. If she lives long enough to grow up.

Off the Bookshelf: STOLEN MAGIC, by Gail Carson Levine

Sequel to  A TALE OF TWO CASTLES

Okay, let's start with a confession -- I picked this up from the library sale shelf because 1) I'm always looking for YA books to see what kids are reading so I can write what they want to read. and 2) the author's name is pretty close to mine!

That being said, I'm going to have to find the previous book to this one, because there is so much about the world of the story I need to know. The farmer girl Elodie left her island home, met a dragon and an ogre, and became assistant to one and friends with the other and the three apparently set off on adventures together. Not only that, but the dragon is a sleuth of some kind, and is apparently training Elodie in that skill.

The whole social structure of this world, with brunkas and bees and a replica of an island that keeps the volcanoes from erupting -- and endangers everyone when it goes missing -- feels like a real world, and that's a pretty nifty trick that a lot of writers out there need to learn.

Elodie and her dragon masteress and the ogre count come home to Elodie's island home and immediately run into trouble -- first in a killer snowstorm, and then with the people who give them shelter. The High Brunka who leads this community is keeper of the Replica of the island, and it has been stolen. Fortunately, the snowstorm keeps all the suspects within the massive building. When the three are separated on various errands to try to warn the inhabitants to evacuate, it might just fall on Elodie to untangle the clues and find the Replica before they're all doomed.

Fascinating world and characters. I should add that the author also produced ELLA ENCHANTED -- y'know, the book that is the basis of the Anne Hathaway movie? Yeah, that Ella. Major fun.

Off the Bookshelf: SUPER POWEREDS, YEAR ONE, by Drew Hayes

Audiobook
Narrator: Kyle McCarley

People with special talents or powers are divided into Supers and Powereds. Supers can control their gifts and are the elites, the ones people admire, most of the time. Even when their gifts are kind of stupid, almost useless. Powereds are looked down on. They have gifts, the ability to fly or control energy or shift shape -- but no control. That makes them dangerous. They're looked down on by Supers and pretty much the rest of the world.

There are certification programs offered at universities for Supers to become licensed heroes. This means they're safe from being sued if, for example, in the course of saving the city from alien invasion, a few buildings get knocked over and people get hurt.

What happens when a few Powereds have a chance to "fix" their control problem, pass themselves off as Supers, and attend the certification program to become heroes? That's what this book, and the series, is about. Alice can fly, Vince absorbs energy, like fire and electricity, Herschel changes into his muscle-bound alter-ago Roy, Mary is the most powerful telepath ever born, and Nick can manipulate luck. Their first year of school, sharing a dorm and figuring out where they fit in, makes for some fun, sad, frustrating, even touching adventures.

Kudos to the narrator for managing to give individual voices to the cast of hundreds!

Off the Bookshelf: THE FANTASY FICTION FORMULA, by Deborah Chester

MAJOR writing guide, well worth the time and effort to read through, mark pages for reference and keeping handy for quoting -- and to re-read, maybe between every project.

Yeah, THAT useful.

And guess what, even if you don't write fantasy, this is a great writing book, period, for any kind of fiction.

I wish she had been one of my creative writing teachers.

I heard about this book either from the Science Fiction Marketing Podcast, or the Writing Excuses Podcast. Can't remember now where I heard the name and title. I just know I made a note on my iPhone while I was getting some exercise and catching up on podcasts, found the book, bought it ... and then, like everything else in life, the book sat on my to-be-read bookshelf until a couple weeks ago, when I finally opened it up and started reading.

Don't waste your time trying to find this book at a used bookstore, to save some money -- because I can bet you no writer worth her salt is going to trade this book in. Ever.

Chester walks through the whole process, from planning to creating characters to understanding the whole scene-and-sequel pairing, and show-vs-tell conundrums  and on and on, to editing and all the "do I gotta?" steps we all hate -- all the totally useful stuff. And she teaches from a slightly different angle than I've heard these principles and extremely useful and helpful tips if I've heard them before, so they struck me as new and fresh and yeah, useful!

Get the book. Invest in a paper copy, so you can underline and highlight and put sticky notes in places where you'll go back again and again. You'll be glad you did!

Off the Bookshelf: WALLY ROUX, QUANTUM MECHANIC, by Nick Carr

Audible Original
Narrated by William Jackson Harper

Short and fun, at the end I wanted more stories about Wally and his adventures "fixing" what's wrong with the fabric of space and time.

Wally is an awkward genius teen who notices when reality doesn't work quite right, and finds a way to fix it, usually with gizmos of his own making. When he least expects it, he encounters people who understand what he's doing -- and in sweet, humorous and sad vignettes, one after another, he finds what he dreams of and tries too hard, and loses it. You gotta feel sorry for the poor guy, even as you laugh and shake your head, because even though he's a genius, there's something in him everyone can relate to.

Things just get more complicated when Wally steps through a rip in space-time and finds a world where another Wally is living the life he wants. Will he get to stay in this world? And what happened to the Wally who belongs to that world?

Listen and find out. And be prepared to say, "Hey, is that ALL?" when you get to the end.

More, please?