The Paper Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg - Review

 

 

Title: The Paper Magician  

Author: Charlie N. Holmberg

Publisher: 47North

Publication Date: September 1st 2014

Pages: 224 pages

Price: $9.97

ISBN: 1477823832

Summary:

Ceony Twill arrives at the cottage of Magician Emery Thane with a broken heart. Having graduated at the top of her class from the Tagis Praff School for the Magically Inclined, Ceony is assigned an apprenticeship in paper magic despite her dreams of bespelling metal. And once she’s bonded to paper, that will be her only magic…forever.

Yet the spells Ceony learns under the strange yet kind Thane turn out to be more marvelous than she could have ever imagined—animating paper creatures, bringing stories to life via ghostly images, even reading fortunes. But as she discovers these wonders, Ceony also learns of the extraordinary dangers of forbidden magic.

An Excisioner—a practitioner of dark, flesh magic—invades the cottage and rips Thane’s heart from his chest. To save her teacher’s life, Ceony must face the evil magician and embark on an unbelievable adventure that will take her into the chambers of Thane’s still-beating heart—and reveal the very soul of the man.

From the imaginative mind of debut author Charlie N. Holmberg, The Paper Magician is an extraordinary adventure both dark and whimsical that will delight readers of all ages.

-       Amazon

First off, I was on my honeymoon when I started this book… and my husband got a little annoyed because I wouldn’t/couldn't put it down! He told me I wasn’t allowed to start the second one until we got home (fair enough).  With that being said, I think its safe to say I really enjoyed this book. There were a couple of things that I wasn’t sure about, but we’ll get to that later.

In the first novel, Ceony has just been assigned her apprenticeship under the surprisingly handsome and talented Magician Thane. I don’t want to give away too much, but Ceony ends up having to test her paper magic skills earlier than she would have imagined. After Thane's heart is stolen, Ceony sets off on a mission retrieve it. The magician who stole Thane's heart forces Ceony to time travel through many of his memories, which is a little odd. I wasn’t quite sure about this part. Many of the memories helped the reader get to know Thane a little better, but I’m not positive they were completely necessary. The book definitely slowed down a little bit in the middle, but have no fear... it picks back up!

Things I liked: This book has the YA features we love: romance, magic, villains, and fantasy. It also has interesting features that are not like YA novels that we love. Paper magic? What? But I like it! I also really liked the paper dog, yep.

Things I didn’t like: The time warp through memories... I just wasn’t sure about it. I also was a little unsure of the setting – past? Present? Both?

All in all, this was a good read and I look forward to reading the following two books in the trilogy!

*Rating 3.5/5 – I would recommend this to friends.