The Glass Magician

FIRST!! If you have not read The Paper Magician, do that first, or you will be hopelessly lost. Okay, anyway. This book (both of them, really) are absolutely delightful. I adore Emery and Ceony, I love the imaginative ways that they use "magic," and I love that the story has a nice balance of action and description. Character development is definitely the best part of this novel. I can't see how anyone could possibly read this novel and NOT fall in love with Emery Thane. Ceony, too, is beautifully captivating and spirited. Their chemistry is, for the most part, realistically conveyed throughout the story from beginning to end, so that the reader truly does feel their meeting was meant to be... and hopes for more. The Glass Magician is also an improvement over The Paper Magician with regard to pacing. In the first book, it felt like the author had so many great ideas that the words were tripping over themselves to tell the story. In this installment, the story is more fluid and polished. My only real complaint is that it felt like Ceony spent a little too much time obsessing over her relationship with Emery.... it would have been nice to see more action and less brooding. All in all, Charlie Holmberg is a natural storyteller. Her stories are so imaginative and I can tell she truly loves what she is creating. Her passion practically jumps off the page. I am looking forward to the third installment.

Nachdem ich mit dem Vorgänger “The Paper Magician” ein paar Startschwierigkeiten hatte, war ich etwas zurückhaltend, was meine Erwartungen an die Fortsetzung angeht. Hier allerdings muss ich sagen, dass mich “The Glass Magician” von Anfang an in seinen Bann gezogen hat. Nach einem etwas ruhigeren ersten Kapitel steigert sich die Spannung je weiter man liest, bis hin zu einem beinahe nervenzerfetzenden Ende. Knapp vor dem Schluss hat die Autorin auf einmal die Erzählperspektive gewechselt, was mich ziemlich in der Luft hängen ließ. Ich habe es generell nicht so gerne, wenn mehrere Perspektiven in einer Geschichte verwendet werden – nicht, dass der Wechsel schlecht gewesen wäre; ich fand die weitere Handlung höchst interessant – und gerade hier wäre mir beinahe das Herz stehen geblieben. Die Autorin hat auf jeden Fall dafür gesorgt, dass ich am Haken geblieben bin. Was die Charaktere angeht, habe ich jetzt im zweiten Teil ein sehr viel besseres Verhältnis zu Ceony als im ersten Teil. Sie erscheint mir weniger halsstarrig und verzogen – was allerdings nicht heißt, dass sie klügere Entscheidungen trifft. (Sie entscheidet auf jeden Fall eher mit dem Herzen, auch wenn sie die Entscheidung vielleicht lieber mit dem Kopf treffen sollte.) Emery ein so angenehmer Zeitgenosse wie eh und je und man sieht sogar recht viel von meinem Lieblingscharakter Mg. Aviosky, was mich sehr gefreut hat. Außerdem lernt man ein paar neue Figuren kennen, die ich alle recht schnell ins Herz geschlossen habe. Besonders aufgefallen ist mir an der Reihe bis jetzt, dass die Charaktere sehr schwarz und weiß sind. Daran scheint es nichts zu rütteln zu geben. Ich habe beim Lesen immer wieder darauf gewartet, dass etwas Unvorhersehbares passiert, dass jemand nicht der ist, der er vorzugeben scheint, aber so wie es aussieht, gibt es das bei Holmbergs Charakteren nicht. Die Bösen sind böse und die Guten sind gut. Ich mag die Welt, die die Autorin in ihren Büchern beschreibt. Nicht nur weil die Geschichte Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts spielt und somit alles viel weicher und ruhiger und weniger hektisch erscheint. Sondern auch weil mir der Hintergrund der Magie gefällt. Dadurch dass nur von Menschen gemachte Dinge wie Glas, Papier oder Gummi verzaubert werden können, wird das Augenmerk auf die Materie gelenkt, was ich sehr interessant finde. Es macht das ganze zwar nicht weniger fantastisch, aber auch nicht zu übertrieben und zu magisch. Ich finde, das Buch und die ganze Reihe hat etwas sehr Bodenständiges. Mein Fazit: Es ist ein wundervolles Buch und sehr stark für den Mittelteil einer Trilogie. Es hat tolle Charaktere und legt ein rasches und trotzdem angenehmes Tempo vor. Ich freue mich schon sehr auf den Abschluss dieser Reihe und bin sehr gespannt wie es wohl weitergeht mit Ceony und Emery.

After reading the Paper Magician, I wanted to find out what happened next. Set three months after the last novel, Ceony is progressing in her apprenticeship. After seeing all the wonders paper magic was capable of, she is now a lot more amenable to becoming a Folder. When Lira's compatriots come looking for revenge, Ceony is thrown once more into adventure. The world-building continues to fascinate me. Every new detail we learn about how magic and magicians function in this world is wonderful. But I have to admit that Ceony is not my favourite kind of protagonist. I found myself disagreeing with her a lot. Every decision she makes seems to have more negative consequences than positive ones. I understand why she feels responsible to solve everything herself, but her arrogance in thinking she can take on the world with not even a year of training is very grating. And the fact that she never learns from her mistakes makes me very unsympathetic to the bad things that happen to her as a consequence. Still, I found this book to be more suspenseful and more interesting than the first. While there was conflict in the last book, it felt very much not "real" because of the fantasy quality of Ceony's journey through Emery's heart. This time, the action is set in the real world, and there is a lot more action than in the last book. I bought book three before I'd finished with book two because at this point I need to know how it all ends.

Good second part of this spectacular trilogy! No puedo esperar a leer la tercera parte, una historia que sorprende y no aburre!

Three months after rescuing Magician Thane, her mentor, Ceony is deep in her apprenticeship with a view to sitting her final exam before becoming a “real magician” herself. Three months ago she defeated the villain who ripped out Thane’s heart, and she restored the heart back to him. In the process, Thane won over her heart (and mine). She lives with what she believes is unrequited love. I am a romance fanatic. I hoped the romance in this book 2 would become the focus of this story. No. There is romance, but not as you find in a typical historical romance novel that I usually read. After I overcame that disappointment and accepted this was a magical adventure, mystery, suspense and love story in that order, I once again loved the book. The tranquil world Thane and Ceony surround themselves in is too idyllic and ofcourse it is shattered. A villain is in hot pursuit of Ceony to gain the knowledge she acquired in the first book. That knowledge can empower the villain, and make him an unstoppable force. While Thane places his trust in the hands of bureaucracy to deal with the evil threats, impatient, arrogant Ceony (the arrogance is fuelled by her previous success against evil), takes matters into her own hands. Once again, Ceony dragged me through her adventures with her, and it was a rollicking ride. I loved it, even though it is terrifying for her, innocent people die, serious injury is suffered, and terrible fears are realised. The romance is ramped up a bit too and that little exposure to it thrilled me, especially since for a moment in time, we had Thane’s perspective on his relationship with Ceony. The world building is easy to follow, and the magic, as described by Ceony, is fascinating. There are a few things that annoyed me about this and the previous book, The Paper Magician. There are historical errors - for example, a young woman would NEVER have been allowed to be an apprentice to an older, single man, completely unchaperoned. There are grammatical errors: Shined is incorrectly used as the past tense instead of “shone.” Ceony, an English girl in England refers to her mother as “mom.” That jolted me out of my chair each time. Other Americanisms are used as well. However, I don’t care. Despite it all, I love this trilogy. The fact that there is MAGIC means that this is historical romance with a twist. As the balance of the story is so GREAT, I forgive the errors. This story is so much more than any errors it contains.