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A review by booksong
A Wizard of Mars by Diane Duane
5.0
I waited a long time for this book, and it didn't disappoint. Once again Diane Duane proves herself capable of adding to and expanding upon this amazing world she's created, in poignant and sweeping style.
Mars, the red planet that has captured Earth's imagination for centuries. And it's also got its hooks into a certain handful of wizards, who are investigating the history of the planet, which is mysterious even by their standards.
But when Kit, involved heart and soul in the Mars project, unwittingly wakes up the dormant message-in-a-bottle that's been waiting for millenia, he will become tied to Mars in ways he could never have imagined. And as usual, there's only one wizard who knows him well enough to follow him down the dangerous path he's embarked on...Nita.
This book was one of the slower paced installments, but I know and love the series well enough by now to fully appreciate both the sci-fi and magical action as well as the quieter character-driven parts. Duane handles all the aspects masterfully as usual, keeping each familiar face true to themselves as well as expanding on the changing parts of their feelings and personalities. And there are a few fun newcomers as well, each already well on their way to becoming a full-fledged denizen of this series, which is already populated with an almost unfair number of brilliant characters.
New spells, new rules, new relationships, and new histories are introduced, bent, broken, and forged. I loved how Duane connected so much of Mars to Earth perceptions, both playing with them and subverting them. The constructs of Martian stereotypes experienced by the wizards were especially clever cameos, and provided both action and some surprising and great humor (think War of the Worlds invasion and a certain Looney Toons Martian!)
I really hope the next installment doesn't take as long to publish as this one did...there's so much left to be explained. In particular, I hope (as I think many others readers of this series do too) to see Dairine's education and search for Roshaun take a bigger role, if not the main one, in the next book. Like Dairine, I miss my stuck-up Wellakhit prince.
As my official 1000th book recorded here, I'm proud it was this one. :)
Mars, the red planet that has captured Earth's imagination for centuries. And it's also got its hooks into a certain handful of wizards, who are investigating the history of the planet, which is mysterious even by their standards.
But when Kit, involved heart and soul in the Mars project, unwittingly wakes up the dormant message-in-a-bottle that's been waiting for millenia, he will become tied to Mars in ways he could never have imagined. And as usual, there's only one wizard who knows him well enough to follow him down the dangerous path he's embarked on...Nita.
This book was one of the slower paced installments, but I know and love the series well enough by now to fully appreciate both the sci-fi and magical action as well as the quieter character-driven parts. Duane handles all the aspects masterfully as usual, keeping each familiar face true to themselves as well as expanding on the changing parts of their feelings and personalities. And there are a few fun newcomers as well, each already well on their way to becoming a full-fledged denizen of this series, which is already populated with an almost unfair number of brilliant characters.
New spells, new rules, new relationships, and new histories are introduced, bent, broken, and forged. I loved how Duane connected so much of Mars to Earth perceptions, both playing with them and subverting them. The constructs of Martian stereotypes experienced by the wizards were especially clever cameos, and provided both action and some surprising and great humor (think War of the Worlds invasion and a certain Looney Toons Martian!)
I really hope the next installment doesn't take as long to publish as this one did...there's so much left to be explained. In particular, I hope (as I think many others readers of this series do too) to see Dairine's education and search for Roshaun take a bigger role, if not the main one, in the next book. Like Dairine, I miss my stuck-up Wellakhit prince.
As my official 1000th book recorded here, I'm proud it was this one. :)