Cloral ~ A world without land

Title: Pendragon : The Lost City of Faar
Author: D. J. MacHale
ISBN: ISBN 0-7434-3732-2

This book series is definitely one of the best series for children and adults alike. For those who are not familiar with it, the Pendragon series is about a boy who learned that he is a Traveler who can travels to different worlds, or territories, and have to save them from destruction planned by the main antagonist of the series, Saint Dane.

In the second book of the series, Bobby Pendragon heads off to the territory of Cloral with Uncle Press. And just like the territory of Denduron that Bobby had explored in Book 1, Cloral also at its crucial turning point. The problem is to find out what the turning point is and stop Saint Dane from taking advantage of it.

If the first book got me excited, I must say that the second was also quite exciting. In fact I think it is a lot better than Book 1. The plot was well-arranged and the setting of the story (which was the territory of Cloral) was very well established. The author believably brought the landless territory and lifestyle on Cloral to reality which readers can easily imagine and understand. I love the settings and falls even more in love when the underwater city of Faar was introduced. It was such a suit setting for the story in the book.

A few new characters were introduced in this book and Vo Spader, the Traveler from Cloral, was the main focus out of all these new characters. He is a good character, cheerful and full of energy with a little bad attributes to add colour to his personality, but he is not as great a character as Bobby Pendragon, our main hero of the series. The character development for Bobby was great, readers can see that he is learning to become a good Traveler and to accept his faith as the one who would defeat Saint Dane. I would love if the author could develop more the character of Wu Yenza too, I think she could become a great character if the author let readers learn more about her and involved her more in the action. I see great potential in her, hopefully she would take center stage in later books.

What about the story? In my opinion, it's well-paced, packed with action, a bit of emotional moments, and definitely fun to read. It expands what the 1st book had established and make it better. I also love the plot about a lost city that need to be discovered in order to save humanity. It was mysterious with a lot of dose of fantasy involved, which made me crave for more.

As a conclusion... yeah, you guessed it, The Lost City of Faar is definitely a worthy book. Fun and exciting. Go grab a copy now!

The art of Flyte

Title : Septimus Heap Book 2 - Flyte
Author : Angie Sage
Illustrator : Mark Zug
ISBN : ISBN 978-0-7475-8449-0


Warning! Spoilers ahead!

Flyte is the 2nd book of the Septimus Heap series. Magyk, the 1st book in the series, is one of my favourite children novel. Let's see how much Flyte can live up to its predecessor.

The book sees the return of the main villain in book 1, Dom Daniel, in his quest to take over the Castle, which is where all our protagonists lived. But this time, he let his newest Apprentice do his dirty work for him (because he is practically just a skeleton after the event in book 1). The book also explores the new lives of our protagonists; Jenna who is now the Young Queen who lived in the Palace, and Septimus Heap who is now the Apprentice to the Extra Ordinary Wizard, Marcia Overstrand. Since the title of the book is Flyte, the main story also involved the ancient art of flying which is thought to be lost.

In general, the story is good with a lot of humor, adventure and a bit of suspense and mystery which will have readers eager to find out what will happen next. Personally, I find the early chapters of the book quite boring but fortunately the story gets interesting as the chapters continues, especially when Septimus begins to embark on his journey to find Jenna who had been kidnapped.

The returning characters are all fun to read about with Aunt Zelda being my absolute favourite. I love reading every chapters she's in. There are also some characters, who are briefly mentioned in book 1, that got featured in more details this time like Jannit Marten, Boy 409 and the 4 Heap brothers that lived in the forest. Some new characters are also introduced like Beetle, Una Brakket, Sleuth (a former tennis ball) and Spit Fyre (Septimus's dragon pet).

I really love the idea of making Simon Heap, the eldest Heap brothers, the main antagonist for this book. I found his character to be the most human from all the other characters; his anger, frustration, self-pity and desire really shone through the pages of the book, I mean I can really relate to his emotions. He's a great character and I wish he would make a comeback in later books in the series.

To sum it up, I think Flyte is a great book but I have to say that Magyk is better. I still love the series though and hopefully book 3, Physik, would be even better.

The Thirteenth Reality ~ Mystery letters of riddles

Title: The 13th Relity: The Journal of Curious Letters

Author: James Dashner

Illustrator: Bryan Beus

ISBN: 1416991522

Warning! Spoilers ahead!

I needed a new book to read. I was looking for a book from a series that I've never heard before; something other than Harry Potter, Septimus Heap, Bobby Pendragon, Artemis Fowl or even Arthur Penhaligon. Those characters are from series that I know, that I've read. I want something new.

The 13th Reality: The Journal of Curious Letters was the book that I picked. The reason I chose it is because I was interested about the story regarding alternate realities. It's a cool theme. So let's start my review with the plot. The story revolves around Tick @ Atticus Higginbottom who received letters with riddles he need to solve if he decide to be on an adventure to save many, many lives. If he wasn't interested, then he can just burn the letters and everything will go back to normal. But of course he'll be interested in the letters, if not this book wouldn't exist.

The main attraction of the book are the riddles in which our main character received in 12 letters. In fact, almost 3/4 of the book involve the riddles, and lucky for us the riddles are quite fun. Readers can actually participate in order to solve the mysteries of the letters. Of course there are several other chapters in between it that involve things other than the riddles but I don't mind if the author completely cover 3/4 of the book with the riddles, like I said they were fun.

The last 1/4 of the book covers their adventures (their as in Tick and his friends) into other realities. To be honest, I was quite dissapointed when Tick finally solved the mystery letters as I was certain the rest of the pages (1/4 of the book that is) wouldn't be much interesting without the riddles. Now I'm glad to say that I was wrong, the last quarter of the book was packed with adventure and action, and clearly was the climax of the story. The author not only can come up with interesting riddles, but he can also write good action stuff too.

Now we move on to the characters. Sadly I think the main character, Atticus Higginbottom, was not as strong a character as some of the main stars that I've read from different series before (a lot of them I had mentioned above). In fact the author tried too hard to make him a good role model that at times he seemed fake. One example of this is when Tick's father constantly remind readers how glad he was to have a good son like Tick.

The other characters doesn't fair well too. Master George was annoying for me instead of funny (funny was what he intended to be). Sofia was a great character but sadly a bit underdeveloped. Paul and Sato were also underdeveloped; but I think Sato will make his presence felt in the future due to his mysterious background. Mothball and Rutger were quite interesting characters but not much were told about them which made readers quite hard to love them. The only character that I think had been developed well was Mistress Jane, the villain of the book. She's a powerful character that shines in every chapter she's in. Although her apperance in the book was not much, the author manage to make her a promising villain.

Although this book was not as great as I had hoped it to be, it was still a fun read largely thanks to the fun-filled and mysterious riddles that out main character needed to solve. The high-action plot near the end of the book was also entertaining and had nicely set up the plot for the next book in the series. I am looking forward to read the 2nd book in the series and judging by the interesting ending and powerful villain, I'm hoping it will be a great sequel to the first book.

Image courtesy of Simon & Schuster.

An adventure like no other

Title: Pendragon: The Merchant of Death
Author: D. J. MacHale
Cover artist: Victor Lee
ISBN: ISBN 0-7434-3731-4

I like the cover. The synopsis behind the book was quite interesting. And the price is cheap. So I thought I should give it a try and bought it. But did I like it?

Pendragon: The Merchant of Death is the first book in the Pendragon series that contains 10 books and several other companion books. I was first interested in it when I was looking for an adventure book to read in a bookstore. I did not know that there were more than half a dozen of books already in the series at that time, and so I bought it and start to read it without any expectation. Boy was I surprised. It was a great book, filled with action, adventure, humor and imagination.

The book is about a young boy named Bobby Pendragon who was taken by his uncle, Uncle Press, to another world (or territory as they called it in the book) named Denduron. He was forced to accept the fact that he was a Traveler, chosen to fight against Saint Dane who planned to bring every territory into destruction. While he was in Denduron, he learned more about the culture and life in that territory, and the conflict that the people on Denduron was facing. In the end, it was up to him, Loor (a traveler from the territory Zadaa), and Alder (a traveler from Denduron) to save Uncle Press who had been captured, and also Denduron from major chaos in the hands of Saint Dane. While on Second Earth (which is the territory that Bobby came from, the present Earth), Mark Dimond and Courtney Chetwynde, Bobby's best friends, were trying to cope with the disappearance of Booby and learning the new life that Bobby was living through a series of journals that Bobby sent them through a portal.

While the story was good, I was particularly interested in the book narrative which keeps on switching between first-person perspective and third-person perspective. The third-person perspective was when the story focus on Mark and Courtney on Second Earth while the first-person perspective was when the story focus on Bobby through his journals. It was an interesting read. D. J. MacHale had also created the territory of Denduron realistically unique. I was even amazed at how closer I felt the conflict was to home although it was happening on Denduron.

Overall, it's a fun book to read and have good moral values in it too. I was looking forward for the second book in the series. Hopefully it will be as good as this one.

Artemis Fowl, the young genius criminal

Book- Artemis Fowl
Author- Eoin Colfer

It's a cheap, entertaining and brilliant book for kids and adult alike.

I first stumbled upon this book in a bookstore and read the synopsis at the back cover. I was not interested at first but since it was cheap (only RM15.90, it's really rare to find books by foreign authors this cheap in Malaysia), I decided to give it a try.

I found the first 2 chapters of the book to be quite boring because I really don't understand what was happening. But as I read on, it's getting more and more interesting. The story is engaging and the characters are totally funny and adorable even when they were cursing in fairies language, the Gnommish.

Artemis Fowl tells a story about a 12-year-old boy who were planning to rob a bank, not just any bank, a fairies bank. Being a genius, he successfully discovered a whole unknown world of fairies. These fairies are far more advanced than humans and so it will only take a genius like him to come out with a flawless plan to separate the fairies from their precious gold. The results; a kidnapped fairy, a ransom, a pissed-off commander, an angry troll, an injured butler, a blue-rinse (you'll understand what it means once you read the book), and a whole lot of chaos. And also, a satisfied reader (which, of course, referring to me!).

What makes this book fun for me is the characters. The main characters like Artemis Fowl, Butler, Holly, Commander Root and Foaly always come out with funny and sarcastic dialogues. They have their own objectives and each characters descriptions helped me to shape their personality more. Even the minor characters are fun to read about.

Another thing that was fun about this book is that the references were everywhere. Even when you thought that that was the first time the character was introduced, the author had actually mentioned the character before in the early pages of the book. I would flipped back the pages and went, "Oh! So that guy was HIM!". I had fun doing that. :-P

Reading the book, I realized that although Artemis Fowl may seem like a cold criminal (amid a young one!), but he was actually a good person. He was like wearing an evil facade to mask the real him inside. And judging by the story, we will see the good side of him...eventually. For now, you have to buy this book to read all about his genius plans to get the fairies' gold. Will he succeed? Well, I'll leave you to find it out yourself.

It’s Magyk!!!

Book- Septimus Heap : Magyk
Author- Angie Sage
Illustrator- Mark Zug

More than half of the posts in this blog are about movies and TV series, and only 2 posts are about books (not including this one). So sad. It may look like I don’t like to read books but actually I do. When I said books, I don’t only mean manga or comic but also novels.

Lately I’m so addicted to children novels. I know I’m too old for them but I can’t help myself. One of my favorite books that I just recently discovered is Septimus Heap: Magyk by Angie Sage. This is the first book in the Septimus Heap series. Currently there are already 4 books in the series with the latest being called Queste.

It tells a story about a young girl, Jenna, who had been raised by a normal family of wizards (the Heap family) and not knowing that she was actually the daughter of the previously murdered Queen until one day when someone wanted to assassinate her, following the order from the evil Necromancer, who was longing for power. For their safety, the wizard family and the little princess had to run away. During their escape, they were joined by a young boy from the Young Army, Boy 412, who was unwillingly caught in the action. Boy 412 were raised by the Young Army and never knew his family. At first he was disgusted with the wizards as it was taught to him in the army that the wizards were the enemies. Eventually, he became close and somewhat attracted to them when he really gets to know them. Together, Boy 412, Jenna and the Heap family must find a way to defeat the evil Necromancer and return Jenna to her rightful place. Also, as they were journey together, Boy 412 finally learned the truth of who he really was.

I like this book because of the settings, the story and also the lovable characters. Boy 412 is such a cutie, his responses to the others’ behaviors sometimes made me laugh. Jenna, strong-willed and kind-hearted, can really inspire children. Marcia Overstrand, the ExtraOrdinary Wizard is just hilarious. And the other characters like Silas Heap, Nicko Heap and Stanley, the Confidential Message Rat, are also amusing. There is not a single character that I don’t like. Even DomDaniel, the evil Necromancer, and his apprentice are fun to read about. Oh, and one more thing. I also love the illustrations by Mark Zug. Nice!

Overall, this book is a must have for children, and of course adults who are into children’s novel (like me!). The story is not too complicated and the settings are just magykal, oops! I mean magical. A fun book to read.

With Harry Potter saying goodbye, Septimus Heap could be the next top wizard.

The best of fantasy novel

I rarely read adult fantasy books. But one day, during my college years (not so long ago actually), I picked this one amazing book called Morningstar by David Gemmell.

Of course at that time, I didn’t know who this guy was. After doing some research, I found out that the author was a bestselling British author of heroic fantasy. Shame on me! He already had his first work of fiction published in 1984 and famous for his debut, Legend. Unfortunately, he already passed away in July, 2006.

I really enjoy reading Morningstar. This is one of my favourite books, one of the best that I had ever read so far. I only borrowed the book at the library at that time. But the story is so good that I planned to buy it.

For a better review of the book, please visit the link below. Better yet, go to your nearest bookstore and buy this book straight away. It’s REALLY good!!!

http://www.sfreviews.net/morningstar.html

Books anyone?

My previous posts are all about movies, TV shows and a few about anime, game and music. So, now it’s time to be educated…with books of course! There are some books that I would like to recommend...let’s start with this one.

This book by Dean Koontz is called The Taking. This book has mystery element in it which I like. The book flows smoothly and there are several incidents in the book that really makes my imagination go wild. However, the author didn’t give any clear conclusion in the end that explains what really happened to the world. You just have to figure out yourselves with few clues left by the author. I have my own conclusion by the way.

The story explores the human behaviours (mainly the bad one of course), and the horrific events that happens in the book is basically punishments to humans.

This book is amazing as it explores the dark side of humanity. It makes you think just what will happen to this world if people keeps on killing other people, being greedy, selfish, and making money and fame out of sins. The scenario that happens in the book may not happen in real world, but it still makes you wonder.

If you’re interested, you can find this book at major bookstores near you. It will only cost you about RM40. Quite cheap for such a good book.