The Paper Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg
Review by Mirah Welday (mwelday)
Ceony Twill is the lucky daughter in her family. She was selected to attend Tagis Praff School for the Magically Inclined. She was a success at school, graduating at the top of her class, but even the most successful students have to select one medium to master, you cannot work with them all. Ceony has always wanted to work with metal but due to a shortage of magicians who work with paper, the choice is made for her. Ceony is disappointed and frustrated and doesn’t know what to expect when she arrives at the ramshackle dwelling of paper Magician Emery Thane to begin her apprenticeship.
Two unlikely allies, Twill and Thane, being Twill’s apprenticeship with a distance between them that eventually gets crossed and takes them both down a path with dangerous and forbidden magic.
When I started reading The Paper Magician I had no idea what to expect. I know you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover but the cover is what drew me to the book in the first place. The plot and story line of the various characters was unlike any other fantasy book I’d read before; I liked the use of one type of medium that the magician can use and manipulate. I thought there was some drag during the middle of book one while Ceony is on her ‘quest’ but that’s really the only negative thing I can say about this debut novel by Holmberg.
I was intrigued so much by book one that I quickly went on to The Glass Magician and The Master Magician, the final two books in the series, and I wasn’t disappointed. There was successful character development and all of the story lines had appropriate conclusions. While I don’t have kids, I think this would be a good book (and series) for parents to read along with their young adult readers so they can discuss the characters, themes, and situations together. I would give the entire series 4 out of 5 stars for ingenuity, interesting characters, and an ability to keep my interest.
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Tags: Book Recommendations, Book Reviews, fantasy, Fantasy Series, magic
