HEART OF BALANCE

I like to think that mages are readers (Roger Zelazny, anyone?) and the malls are now full of (often bad and derivative) occult fiction (though Simon R. Green and Jim Butcher are very fun!). But right now I am really hooked on Kate Griffin's A Madness of Angels; one reviewer compared it to Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere as a depiction of magical London (high praise!), and I must say it is very wild stuff and very juicy prose and rips right along. The sequel Night Mayor is already out, and the third Neon Court is coming. This has spawned a semi-related series of YouTubes also documenting magical London: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kennh24ACKk Of course there are a lot of other arcane fantasies, Tim Powers has some great work (Last Call is brilliant, and his On Stranger Tides is the basis of the current Pirates of the Caribbean sequal). In the YA category Susan Cooper's Dark Is Rising series was arguably better than Harry Potter in some ways (and hers was first), and F. Paul Wilson's Repairman Jack series is reaching a pulsating climax.... but try A Madness of Angels and see what you think! Anyone else have recommendations? and remember that a lot of this is free at your local library.... ~Shade YouTube - Videos from this email