Magic On The Line by Devon Monk - review

Magic On The Line

Devon Monk

UF - released 11/29/11

ppb

******

cover-I have a mixed feelings about the covers in this series. Mostly I love the covers. I love the markings on the model, and her kick-ass yet at times vulnerable look. What I don't like, is that most of the time she is depicted as so skinny, with no muscle tone that it's hard to believe that this is the character who is such a walker - Allie Beckstrom is a rich girl who has rebelled against her background to such a degree that she lives off what she earns on her own - to the point where she's had to walk almost everywhere in Portland, Oregon; from the walking and the recent fighting/training her muscles - especially on her thighs - should be a bit more developed. I'm picturing the legs/body of a dancer. Have you watched dancers legs and bodies? Not ballet dancers, but the dancers such as the ones that you can see on Dancing With the Stars? Those women cannot afford to be stick thin, they have muscles and real bodies. They are sexy with their muscles and toned bodies without being stick skinny and having their bones poke out on their chests....Now this cover isn't quite as skinny as a few others, but her thighs are way to small for a real walker. I would also love to see a more accurate depiction of her magic marks, which are supposed to travel all the way from the side of her face down to her shoulders/chest to her side and her arms. And on the other side, she's supposed to be sporting some thick bands of color - like stripes - on her fingers, her wrists, elbow area and a bit higher up. Don't get me wrong, I think the artist does do a great job (except for the excessive skinnyness) but I would love to see a complete picture of ALL of Allie's magic "tattoos" or markings. I think it would be cool to see, and when I'm reading the series, I'm always trying to picture them in my mind (expecially since Ms Monk describes them or mentions them at least twice in each book.) I admit though, that these covers do a better job than many other urban fantasy books of representing the character and the setting.

Now - the book. Devon Monk is one of those writers that I can say (every time) that I love her work. Love them. There are a lot of writers that are on my autobuy list (it's a list that resides in my head - Hope I don't forget anyone) that is full of what I consider to be quality writers, but even though they're all on my autobuy list, not all are writers that I can say I absolutely LOVE their work. Monk is one of them. There are others, but if I start mentioning them, I'm going to get all OCD and want to make a list, and then I'll want to make a separate list of young adult writers (it would be a short list, haha) and THEN I'd want to alphabetize them, sort them, etc...and it would end up to be a completely different post.

O.K., Now, for reals - now Magic On The Line. Anyway, after the events of the past few books, there is a new head of Authority in Portland and he's making some hard decisions. Zay is having to do things he hates to friends he loves, and Allie isn't too happy. Weird things are happening to the houds and magic users...then on top of everything else, Allie finds herself once again in hiding - from the Authority AND the law this time. Not only that, but suddenly she's having a hard time accessing magic - something that has always been so easy for her, so natural. Things are going to hell in a handbasket, for sure.

I think that this is the next to final book in the series - if not then it's very close to the final book. Things are definitely coming to a head - story arc-wise. A few more hints about Allie's magical history are given...has she really been closed? if so how many times? Is her dad really an evil guy (as evil as Allie believes?), or is he a guy who's simply ready to do what ever he has to, to make a dollar and make magic accessible. There's more to Allie and her father's past than she's been told...can't wait to find out what's going on - or what went on. And as usual Devon Monk has managed to write a novel full of hard decisions, horrific happenings, heartache/break and STILL managed to fit in some snarky dialog, and excellent words between the characters. You would think that this should be easy - but it's not everyone (speaking of authors) who can have their characters speak naturally, the way the real people in everyday lives speak. Many times, the speech patterns don't really match the characters or the times that the book is set in. I've enjoyed the dialog as well as the plots and narration of Devon Monk's novels - and Magic On The Line is no exception to this.

It's hard to write much about a book, especially one this far along in a series without spoilers, so I'm trying to keep this to generalities. In general, we see a lot of return characters - with a focus on Allie (of course, main character and pov) Zayvion Jones, Shamus and Terric. Stone, the Gargoyle appears. Victor, Maeve, Davy and a few others play important roles, but aren't seen much. New characters are introduced - Bartholomew and a Doctor Collins (a very strange man) and a few others are returning characters who have played small parts before.

All in all, a very interesting installment with the usual wonderful, magical touch of Devon Monk's way with words put together in a book that I enjoyed very much. If you've been thinking about getting into this series, DO IT, YOU WON'T REGRET IT. If you're waiting to get this book, and are a follower - get it as soon as you can, you'll want to read this one.

It's Monday

It's been a weird week. Work has been weird, the kids have been great - sometimes I could do without the grown ups though. lol. The weather has been strange. After days of cooler weather, we had extremely windy days with temps of 70 F, in the afternoons, with very cold nights. The nights have been close to freezing - I know that's warmer that a lot of places at this time of year, but the temperature range has been a little extreme, especially with the wind. Anyway, glad one week's over, and hope this next week is better. However, after 15 years of working with children in the school system, I've learned that even though you might get a "good job" once in a while, most of the time you're expected to work miracles with the homework and behaviour - and this expectation is not only from the parents, but from the teachers and administrators - even though they should know better, since the same thing is done to them. It's a mostly thankless job. Most of the people that I know that are in this line of work are in doing it for a general love of children. It's certainly not for the money or working conditions! Once in a while though, I get a visit form a student from years past - one who says they miss me and the afterschool program. The thing that gets to me is when I get that type of comment from a kid that I was particularly tough on. However they remember me, I know I genuinely have a good time with the children. It's the rest of the job that gets to me sometimes. :) when you get right down to it, what other job gives you an opportunity to laugh at silly things, play an occasional game, read to kids and have the kids read to you and in general enjoy a lot of laughs and hugs from the students. Not many!

It is now time for It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

Hosted by Sheila of Book Journey, this is a weekly meme that we use to let each other know what we've read the past week, what we're planning to read and what we're currently reading...and other bits and pieces of life. It's a fun meme - on that I try to take part of every Monday.

True to form, I did not finish many books. I, in fact, finished only one novel, and that one was Devon Monk's latest, Magic On The Line. It was great - as usual. I've come to expect great reads out of Devon Monk, and I haven't been disappointed yet. I think I took a while to read it because I know the series is coming to an end.

There's been quite a few of those lately, series that are being ended by the author - ending on high notes, with readers like me wanting more. These ladies know what they're doing, and thankfully they are all working on new series. Keeping us interested and wanting more. Nice. Better than having a series go on and on and on, changing so much that they don't resemble the beginning novels, or worse yet not going anywhere, the characters saying and doing the same old thing over and over...or a combination of the tw0 - which is really the worst....We don't have to worry about that with Devon Monk, Lili St.Crow/Lilith Saintcrow or Rachel Vincent - all authors who have ended their series after 6 to 10 novels of supreme goodness. :) I have a lot of respect for their decisions and I also think it's pretty brave of them, as well as smart. It must be kind of tough to say goodbye to characters and a series that is still popular; it's gotta be tempting to keep grinding out novels in the same series, that's probably become comfortable to play in - if one can ever consider writing a novel to be "comfortable" - I know it's a lot of work. (lol - some authors actually BLEED on their keyboard and suffer horribly with emo-ness while writing and .....yeah. if you go to the link, please...for God's sake- for the love of all that's SANE, read with a grain of salt. The belief's can be hazardous to your blood pressure or mental health - for a cure, read this reply from a more grounded author.) These authors had a clear vision of how their series was going to go, and stuck with their plan - and are currently publishing new series or are close to finishing new novels. More to look forward to. off to other things, now!

currently reading
Shady Lady by Ann Aguirre - writer of the close to ending Sirantha Jax series. This third novel in the Corinne Solomon series is very interesting - I'm enjoying it more than the second, almost as much as the first novel in the series. Good series, over all. I'm almost halfway through it, and looking forward to finishing it (in a good way, lol)

next up will be a book sent to me for review by Devin O'Branagan. This is her newest novel, Threshold. It looks interesting; two main characters, one an adult, the other a young boy who has either came close, or actually died, brought back and finding himself on a mission, without a clear memory, and many in danger. Sounds spooky! Looking forward to it.

waiting for....(from B&N - again. I go shopping for a book on the book's release day, and it's NOT on the shelves. Have to special order, which means I don't get it the minute it comes out - wouldn't have been able to read it right away, anyway - but it's nice to have that option, right? And what's up? How can the authors get their release week sales, if the stores DON'T EVEN STOCK IT?) <<--- ugh - gettin' all riled up! This happened with Magic On The Line, and also with Reckoning. C'Mon! B&N! I don't have a lot of shopping choices left, please get your act together! make sure your employees are shelving those books! I say this because the clerk LOOKED up the info, and according to the computer, Fate's Edge was IN the store since 11/23, but no one could find one copy of it. And they hadn't sold any. S0- Waiting on Fate's Edge by Ilona Andrews. This is part of the Edge series - LOVE that series. The characters are all twisted, and they live in a twisted world, with twisted animals and problems. So interesting. It's written in a different style than Ilona Andrew's Kate Daniels' series, but I find it just as interesting, the dialog just as snarky as the other series.

I also bought for the school two copies of Diary of a Wimpy Kid's Cabin Fever. I plan on reading it to a few classes. I remember seeing the first novel in the series come out, novel/comic book fusion and thought, wow, this looks interesting - but I really thought Jim Benson's Dear Dumb Diary series was way more funny. Ironically, even though the kids at school have checked out the DDD books over and over, they go ballistic over the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. We have only one copy of each of the series, and they are ALWAYS checked out. This is one book that gets stolen from other kids. Sad - but that shows how popular they are - kids will STEAL the books from each other. I think both series are pretty funny, and they both get boys as well as girls engaged with reading - it's hard to get your average boy to WANT to read fiction.

That's it for now. I've spent way too much time working on links and looking up author pages... I do this every Monday. Plan on a quick post, and go a bit overboard, soapboxing, linking up links, posting pics, ranting and raving...

:) It's fun.