Among Others

I have just finished reading Among Others.
I wanted to post up immediately because I loved it so much!

I will write more about this book very soon.

[... several days later ...]

It is sort of hard for me to express in words how much I love this book. It is the first of Jo Walton's books I have read and it's at times like this that I am especially pleased that I took on this reading "challenge". By which I mean that I probably would not have picked this book up if I had not been on my own little quest to read books written by women. The cover (for me) gave no real indication of how awesome this novel is.

Anyway, you know (if you have read any of my other entries) that I am not much good at reviews and that I hate to give spoilers. So ...

Among Others is written in a diary format. The main character, Morwenna, has been badly injured in a car-accident. She goes to live with her father (who abandoned / escaped from Morwenna's mother many years previously).

She is then sent to a boarding school. While there, she finally finds some friends in a Science Fiction reading group at the local library.

The book features a lot of discussion of Science Fiction and Fantasy books (her father is also a fan of the two genres). I loved this, obviously ...

There's much more to the book, of course. Morwenna can do magic and sees fairies. The way Walton handles the magic, and Morwenna's thinking-through of the ethics of doing magic were truly outstanding.

The book resonated with me very strongly. It is set in 1979 and 1980 (at which time I was a nine-year old SF fan!). Much of it takes place in Shropshire and Wales (places in which I also spent part of my childhood). The way Walton works the magic into the story is brilliant and I loved her description of the fairies she meets.

Oh well, just go and read it will you!