# Revelation, by Carol Berg

Transformation, by Carol Berg

Lyra's Oxford, by Philip Pullman

Sweet little book, or rather, short story. It happens in the alternate Oxford universe, which we see in His Dark Materials, and features Lyra and her daemon Pantalaimon. There are a few "goodies" in the book, such as a map of Lyra's Oxford, a postcard, and other little oddities. As Philip Pullman says in the preface, they may be connected to the story. Or they may not. Who is to know? Not me... This specific story talks about Lyra finding a witch's daemon flying around on its own. That starts a little quest where she tries to find out why this daemon is alone, so far away from the owner. There's some running around Oxford in the dark, what lays out a mysterious backdrop for a small story that whets the appetite. It's interesting and sweet, but I'm not sure I can say it is satisfying because it left me wanting more.

I have no idea what Pullman has been brewing, if anything, but I wouldn't mind a return to the HDM universe. In any case, a movie of The Golden Compass is in the works and is scheduled for release December 2007. I'm really looking forward to it! The movie's web site (http://goldencompassmovie.com) has some beautiful shots, but nothing that displays daemons.

Shadow of the Giant, by Orson Scott Card

To Reign in Hell, by Steven Brust

I thought this book had a lot of potential when I first looked at it. It is a fictionalized form of what Judeo-Christian scripture says about the creation of the world, of angels, and of mankind. Since this kind of material is thrown around after having been removed from canonical texts, it has an aura of myth that I thought would be interesting to explore in a work of fiction. Well, this book wasn't exactly a good opportunity for that.

The cast of characters is large and it became very hard to deal with all the names of angels and archangels after 30 pages. Michael, Samael, Raphkiel, Raziel, Belial, Beelzebub, Yaveh, Lilith, and a dozen others. I couldn't really say that characters were well developed. With so many similar names and little more than a few sentences to create a background for each character, it was hard to assimilate who they were individually and it was hard to develop any connection to them. For the short book this is, it was surprisingly hard to wade through and I attribute this to the fact that I never really cared much about what happened. This doesn't mean the story is uninteresting. It is creative (even if blasphemous) and it could have been a good read, perhaps even a great read, if the writing had been more careful.

How to Travel with a Salmon, by Umberto Eco

This is a great collection of essays that connects the amazing author of "Foulcault's Pendulum" with a more human persona. Well, by more human I mean that it shows his great sense of humour (sarcastic, sardonic, cynic), not that it sheds the high level thoughtfulness and intellectual point of view that defines Eco as a person. The first essay, the one about the salmon is killer. The last line, however, really suffered in the translation from Italian to English: "I asked for a lawyer and they brought me an avocado." Most of the essays, with the exception of "Stars and Stripes" are short, sweet, and carry a depth that must be explored by the reader according to mood and taste. I'm sold; I'll be reading his other collections in the future.

Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince, by J. K. Rowling

A barrel of fun. Although I found the first three books a bit formulaic, Rowling's style evolved in as the series went on, as the subject matter and the characters got more mature. I find it fascinating that if a young reader starts the series at Harry's age in the first book and reads one volume per year, he or she will find that each successive book will grow alongside the reader's level of maturity. The end is chaotic, fast, breath-taking and, heart-rending. I'm nervously and anxiously waiting for The Deathly Hallows, which I pre-ordered as soon as Amazon allowed me to.