(2005) Third in Stroud's series about the crafty and cynical djinni Bartimaeus, and the wizard who summoned him. This series has grown on me, and this entry caps it off very nicely. I read this on audiobook during a long drive, which is a good way to consume this series: Simon Jones's narration is just delicious.
An early birthday present from a friend who lives on the other side of the world who did get a bit stressed that the Australian release date for this would arrive before the book did (funnily enough it arrived day of). Genuinely hilarious getting a text suggesting that I stay out of bookshops 🤣 This is one of my most anticipated books of the year.
A character can have violet eyes.
Fine.
But, in my experience, if someone in the book has violet eyes, it's mentioned ad nauseum.
I counted 15 times in this book.
Great book, but those damn violet eyes 😡
#Read2025
I went to the library to pickup 🏷️book, ‘cause my Kobo died died a few days ago & I was at 63%. I tried, but reading on my phone was horrendous😱😳. As per all my successful library trips, I came away with 3 bonus TBR adds & 5 new bookmarks♥️ The Archie‘s were an impulse buy off the discarded items shelf🤓
pickAh, someone took the idea “what if there's actually something sinister behind all the murders happening in [small town]“ and ran with it.
I found it a bit slow at times, and just... didn't wholly click with it. But overall it was a fun idea.
pickPrime Iain Banks, well his second. Interconnected characters across worlds and eons. Is he telling us that there‘s no such thing as coincidence. It was great to re-read this. I first saw this in Paperback Parade in Swindon in 1986, I guess. I then asked for it and the Wasp Factory for Christmas. These were the first contemporary novels I read. Only forty years ago, or so.
pickI didn‘t find this one quite as immersive and difficult to put down as the first, but Wells is an incredibly gifted storyteller. There‘s plenty of action and deep history of the world Wells created. If the real world wasn‘t such a mess, I probably would have loved this more and finished it faster. Kudos to Wells for keeping me coming back.
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