Reading Report
Ptolemy's Gate is the last book in the Bartimaeus Trilogy by Jonathan Stroud; I really enjoyed the first two books of the trilogy but I thought Ptolemy's Gate was even better. The story starts three years after the end of The Golem's Eye. For two of these three years, the djinni Bartimaeus has been working constantly for his master, Nathaniel, who is now Information Minister and one of the most important people in the government. Two years spent in this world have not been good for Bartimaeus's essence, however: when the story opens, he has become extremely weak and is lying crushed underneath a public lavatory while a magical battle rages overhead. Meanwhile Kitty, one of the last surviving member of the Resistance, has taken to studying the magic and history of the magicians she despises, hoping to stop the endless cycle of conflict between magicians, djinn, and commoners. Dealing as it does with the theme of power and its misuse, the Bartimaeus Trilogy is darker than many other young adult fantasy books, and often lends itself to political commentary: in Ptolemy's Gate, much Nathaniel's job as Information Minister involves producing propaganda for the troubled war in America. These elements are well balanced by Bartimaeus's snarky, sarcastic comments and his humorous first-person sections of the story, however. Ptolemy's Gate takes all the loose threads of the previous books and brings them to a dramatic conclusion (which left me teary-eyed), with a couple of neat twists along the way.
The Kin by Peter Dickinson is an omnibus edition of four shorter books, each with a different viewpoint character. It's set 200,000 years ago in Africa, and the Kin of the title are the first people with language. The Moonhawk Kin is driven from their Good Places by murderous strangers, and the overall story is about their adventures as they search for new Good Places. The main characters - Suth, Noli, Ko, and Mana - are children who find their place as people as the Kin finds their place in the world. The Kin is sort-of fantasy, sort-of not; the people and places are invented, but the closest thing to magic in the story are the god-like Old Ones, which the Kin tell Oldtales about, and which sometimes speak to people through dreams or trances. It was very good, and a nice break from my usual reading.
Zahrah the Windseeker by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu is another young adult fantasy novel, recommended to me by the owner of our local independent bookstore. Zahrah has always known she's different from other people - after all, she has little green vines growing from her hair - but even she is surprised when she starts to develop the ability to fly. Since Zahrah is already teased for being unusual anyway, she reveals her new ability to just one person, her best friend Dari. The only place Zahrah and Dari can find for her to practice in private is the outskirts of the Forbidden Greeny Jungle, which Dari has been reading about in The Forbidden Greeny Jungle Guide. When Dari is bitten by a poisonous snake, it up to Zahrah to journey far into the Forbidden Greeny Jungle to find the only antidote that will prevent her friend from being trapped in eternal sleep.The story is fairly short, has the stereotypical person-with-magic-powers-goes-on-a-quest plot, and many events in story seem too convenient, but the unusual and charming setting - the Ooni Kingdom on the planet Ginen - makes the story worth reading.