TOP TEN REASONS TO ADD GRAHAM 2 TO YOUR BOOKSHELF
Posted on October 12, 2012
10. The Flying Mummy plays a big part. And your life will be better for having read of the exploits of Cascade's airborne pharaoh. I mean, really, what more do you want in your fantasy novels? He's a mummy who flies. And he shows up in some fashion in every Cascade novel. That's his thing.
9. Graham has to deal with a bully. Blord is back and adding even more complications to Graham and his sister's life. Wait until you see how badly he gets the siblings over a barrel this time. Does he go too far? Is there a chance for redemption for him? You read Graham 2 and tell me. I will say this, he will be back in Graham 3.
8. A harpy is given a role that involves more than smelling bad and looking nasty. In fact, this story has one of the most original takes on the half-bird/ half-woman motifs. And we all know reading a book that mentions motifs will make your literary dining conversation sparkle. Picture this: "Don't mind if I do have another shrimp puff. Say, I'm reading just the most interesting novel involving the exploitation of the harpy motif to make a comment on beauty, savagery and what it means to be a family. You really must read it." – You being overheard talking to an aristocrat named Muffy at a shi shi soiree.
7. Gargoyles, man. Talk about an underutilized magical creature. Sure, there are vampires, zombies and werewolves every which where. Throw a stick and you can't miss hitting one of those tired creeps. But who's doing the real exploration of new magical creatures? Who's peeling back the façade of stony little winged fellows and showing you what makes them tick? Yes, Graham is lacking in the abs department, but you know where he's not lacking? The heart. The heart.
6. You know that heart thing I mentioned in Reason Seven? Graham 2 has it in spades. You will get choked up from reading about the travails of this little gargoyle and his sister. It passes the Ole Yeller test, folks. I guarantee you'll mist up at least once reading about Graham and Flenn. Just the Widow Stemmel scenes alone are loaded for emotional bear.
5. Cascade's wack-a-doodle flora and fauna. Where else can you go and encounter, hushrooms (fungus that takes your voice away if ingested), sagbottom root (a plant that affects gravity's pull on one's posterior), tatterpillars (nasty insects who will leave you in shreds) and blossom possums (just the cutest rodents decked out with flower camouflage). All these great plants and animals and more are key parts of the plot.
4. Troll politics. You have not experienced the world until you see the way those little guys legislate. It is a sight to behold how they create a government of the people, for the people and by the people and then toss in a Cave of Contemplation that puts the atrium in the Justice building to shame. Politicking never looked so good.
3. Cascade, it's a magical world where all the different magical, mystical and mythological beings fled to when mankind stopped believing in them. There, they use the belief in each other to keep from fading away. Or do they? This is the major entanglement in the story and isn't it tidy and very cunning of me to make it the very problem they have to overcome? It's a crazy-quilt world that just has so much intrigue.
2. The tenuous and meaningful bond between a brother and sister. The story lets both Flenn and Graham tell their story by alternating chapters between the two characters as third person narrators. You can get inside their heads and see that their relationship is more than just sibling rivalry and/or chivalry.
1. Imagination. If Reasons Ten through Two haven't proven that Graham 2 has this, then I really don't know what will impress you.