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A review by crookedtreehouse
The Books of Magic, Volume 3: Reckonings by Peter Gross, John Ridgway, Peter Snejbjerg, John Ney Rieber
3.0
Sandman flawlessly creates a continuity by first stitching together short stories and introducing you to seemingly unrelated characters.
Hellblazer creates a continuity by unfolding one character's history a chapter at a time, establishing patterns of behavior, setting up expectations and occasionally shattering them. Hellblazer is not quite as successful as Sandman, partially because it has a series of creators, and significantly more story to tell.
Books Of Magic tries to build story upon story, creating a denser world. It wants to be a faerie story, a magic story, a DC Universe story, a coming of age story, a story about neurosies, a romance, a story about fathers and sons, and it it only succeeds in being any of those things on the surface.
This volume reads like an inferior version of [a:Mike Carey|9018|Mike Carey|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1334894864p2/9018.jpg]'s [b:The Unwritten, Vol. 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity|6471550|The Unwritten, Vol. 1 Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity|Mike Carey|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327887253l/6471550._SX50_.jpg|6662356]. It actually predates that book by about twenty years, but it hits several of the same notes. But here Books Of Magic sounds like a clunky, but well-conceived album recorded on someone's home 8-track recorder. One that was in dire need of repair. It's charming and fun to experience but it's not great. The ideas are all here but they're fleshed out clumsily, and the story feels too scattered. Where as Unwritten is incredibly focused and polished.
The romance feels awkward and insincere. The rules of magic in the universe are never adhered to. The gun that shows up in the second act is never fired. The foreshadowing is never delivered on.
I can't recommend this series, particularly this volume, to someone who loves the Sandman/Hellblazer/Swamp Thing Universe that this story exists in. It feels like a Much Lesser Sandman side story. Not terrible, but just not up to the standards of the other series it intersects with.
Hellblazer creates a continuity by unfolding one character's history a chapter at a time, establishing patterns of behavior, setting up expectations and occasionally shattering them. Hellblazer is not quite as successful as Sandman, partially because it has a series of creators, and significantly more story to tell.
Books Of Magic tries to build story upon story, creating a denser world. It wants to be a faerie story, a magic story, a DC Universe story, a coming of age story, a story about neurosies, a romance, a story about fathers and sons, and it it only succeeds in being any of those things on the surface.
This volume reads like an inferior version of [a:Mike Carey|9018|Mike Carey|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1334894864p2/9018.jpg]'s [b:The Unwritten, Vol. 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity|6471550|The Unwritten, Vol. 1 Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity|Mike Carey|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327887253l/6471550._SX50_.jpg|6662356]. It actually predates that book by about twenty years, but it hits several of the same notes. But here Books Of Magic sounds like a clunky, but well-conceived album recorded on someone's home 8-track recorder. One that was in dire need of repair. It's charming and fun to experience but it's not great. The ideas are all here but they're fleshed out clumsily, and the story feels too scattered. Where as Unwritten is incredibly focused and polished.
The romance feels awkward and insincere. The rules of magic in the universe are never adhered to. The gun that shows up in the second act is never fired. The foreshadowing is never delivered on.
I can't recommend this series, particularly this volume, to someone who loves the Sandman/Hellblazer/Swamp Thing Universe that this story exists in. It feels like a Much Lesser Sandman side story. Not terrible, but just not up to the standards of the other series it intersects with.