Book #15 of 2023: Bravely by Maggie Stiefvater This seems like it should have been an easy layup: beloved YA fantasist (and Celticist) Maggie Stiefvater writing an officially licensed sequel to Pixar’s Brave, the one about ancient Scottish magic, the mom who turns into a bear, and the headstrong daughter who breaks the curse by …
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Book #164 of 2022: Greywaren by Maggie Stiefvater (The Dreamer Trilogy #3) I’ve been steadily losing patience with this Raven Cycle spinoff from the start of the second volume on, and unfortunately, nothing in this final novel (which appears to close out the entire franchise, at least for now) does anything to reverse that trend. …
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Book #303 of 2021: Opal by Maggie Stiefvater I’ve heard author Maggie Stiefvater refer to this Raven Cycle sequel as a novella, but at 38 pages, it’s probably scraping the lower limit of what could fairly be given that designation. It’s really more of a quick interlude in the lives of her heroes Ronan Lynch …
Book #197 of 2021: Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater (The Dreamer Trilogy #2) Author Maggie Stiefvater has always prioritized ambiance and personal relationships over concrete plot, so I wouldn’t say that the slowness of this latest Raven Cycle spinoff is a total surprise. And yet — perhaps befitting a series about characters bringing their dreams …
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Book #241 of 2019: Call Down the Hawk by Maggie Stiefvater (The Dreamer Trilogy #1) Author Maggie Stiefvater’s excellent Raven Cycle left plenty of open ends for potential further exploration, and this first volume in its sequel series capably picks up one of the more compelling ones: the ability of certain characters to bring forth …
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Book #130 of 2016: Sinner by Maggie Stiefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls #4) A weird and kind of unnecessary add-on to the Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy. I’m generally a fan of supporting characters getting to tell their own stories – that’s what’s given us such classics as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead or …
Book #118 of 2016: Forever by Maggie Stiefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls #3) One thing I really appreciate about this book series, beyond its great character work and fairly original spin on werewolves, is how much the status quo changes from novel to novel. Structurally speaking, Forever is largely an inverse of the first …
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Book #98 of 2016: Linger by Maggie Stiefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls #2) This book was sadder than the first one in the Wolves of Mercy Falls series, but it also had less in the way of ridiculous teenage hormones, so that was a nice change. Plus I really appreciated how it dealt with …
Book #78 of 2016: Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls #1) “Sexy teen werewolves” is usually not my genre of choice, but Maggie Stiefvater’s characters are so well-realized that I was hooked on this novel regardless. Even a character like Isabel Culpepper, who could easily have been just a mean-girl stereotype, gains …
Book #42 of 2016: The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater (The Raven Cycle #4) The Raven Cycle is a series that defies narrative conventions of the fantasy genre in a lot of ways. There’s no big bad for the series; this final book’s villain was introduced at the end of the previous novel and is …
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