Skip to main content

The Rise of the Evening Star

By curlyq
The Rise of the Evening Star
By Brandon Mull
Shadow Mountain, 2007. 441 pp. Chapter book.

For anyone who has not yet read the second book in the Fablehaven series, go check it out or put it on hold! Although I found the first book, Fablehaven, to be a fun story, I thought the second far exceeded the first. The story begins with a bang and continues to be jam-packed with action, adventure, and mysterious magical situations. Lots of interesting twists and turns keep the story from being predictable. Although it is a book that will be enjoyed by those who have liked previous magical-fantasy stories, it has originality and a distinct flavor all its own.

After I'd read the first Fablehaven book, I was expecting the second story to have about the same interest for me. I enjoyed the first book, but I thought it was slow getting started and wasn't really enthralled until the end. However, I was delightfully surprised when its sequel captured me from the very first page. I loved that the story began outside the bounds of Fablehaven and actually would have liked to see more of the story take place in the ordinary world. The new characters introduced added a nice complexity to the plot without overdoing it. I found the "magicky" details very fun and even more interesting than those discussed in the previous book. The ending of The Rise of the Evening Star was probably the most disappointing for me as I felt Brandon Mull tried to hastily wrap everything up but still leave lots of loose ends for another book. The ending definitely felt rushed to me, but overall, this was a wonderful, fast paced, completely magical adventure that can be enjoyed by the whole family.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: The Factory

By
The Factory By Catherine Egan New York, NY : Scholastic Inc., 2025. Fiction. 306 pages.  Thirteen-year-old Asher Doyle has been invited to join the Factory, a secretive research facility in the desert which ostensibly extracts renewable energy from the electromagnetic fields of its young recruits. But Asher soon realizes something sinister is going on. Kids are getting sick. The adults who run the Factory seem to be keeping secrets. And the extraction process is not only painful and exhausting, but existentially troubling. Asher makes a handful of new friends who help him with an investigation that turns into a resistance, which turns into...a cliffhanger! The Factory is a page-turning sci-fi with multidimensional characters, an intriguing plot, and refreshingly straight-forward writing. Egan weaves in detail about climate crises and social unrest, making the story's dystopian setting feel rich and plausible. With its sophisticated themes and accessible storytelling, I would recomm...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review: Fowl Play

By
  Fowl Play By Kristin O'Donnell Tubb New York: Katherine Tegen Books, 2024. Fiction 277 pages. Still reeling from her beloved uncle's death, Chloe Alvarez is comforted and confused when at his last will and testament reading, Uncle Will gifts her his African Grey parrot, Charlie. Charlie has a robust vocabulary and loves to make Alexa requests for her favorite songs, but when she starts saying things like, "homicide," and "cyanide," Chloe becomes convinced that Uncle Will may have met his demise by murder instead of a genetic disease, as was previously thought. Ultimately, bringing in her brother, Grammy, and Uncle Frank (and of course Charlie,) Chloe's ragtag and adoring family support her search for answers ---going on stakeouts, engaging in fast pursuits, and searching for clues. But as the suspects stack up and the mystery grows, Chole will learn that the process of death and grieving is complicated, and in the end her Uncle Will's words that, ...
Post a Comment
Read more

National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry

By DeeDee
National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry Edited by J. Patrick Lewis National Geographic, 2012, 183 p. Poetry In this beautiful poetry collection, the National Children's Poet Laureate, J. Patrick Lewis, has teamed up with the amazing photographers at National Geographic. The result is 200 poems about animals, all illustrated with stunning nature photography.  The poems are well chosen and include rhyming, free verse, and shape poetry. Some of the poems are funny, many are contemplative and all are nicely typeset on top of the full color photographs. One of my favorites is a shape poem about flamingos, with a photograph of a flock of flamingos which seem to be standing the the shape of a flamingo (how did they do that?).  Lewis ends the collection with a brief but interesting section about writing animal poetry.  This selection is sure to turn any animal lover into a poetry lover.
Post a Comment
Read more