Three is the magic number. That is how many rooms Theo Saint has ever seen. Three is how many people he knows in his life. Three and Zero and are the amount of minutes he is allowed outside of his designated area per year. Theo has a deadly disease. He wears gloves constantly and is monitored day and night. He has to get treatment in the ‘Mercy Tube’ or the disease gets worse but one day someone kidnaps Theo!

I’ve been reading quite a few children/YA books lately and I think I’ve found a recurring theme. A good children/YA fantasy book contains the following: a young boy or girl, they have powers, it is set in a relatively modern world, it is fast paced and it has strange creatures. Candle Man by Glenn Dakin contains all of the above.

A couple of girls in my class said that the book was very good so I put it at the top of my TBR pile and was I in for a great treat. Theo for a boy who has been sheltered from the outside world for all of his life was never dull, never self loathing but took everything in his stride and everything was a great interest to him. This is a testament to Dakin himself. He wrote the story with a few subplots but never did they get in the way of the major story and in the end he tied it all up perfectly.

What I also liked about the story were the creatures that gave the book a fantasy feel to it. Gone are the usual dwarves, orcs and elves; they are replaced with smoglodytes, extinct creatures and the forgotten gargoyles (with a twist).

I can’t wait to see how much attention this book will get because it is right up there in terms of quality with books like Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.

Review written for Best Fantasy Books by Enchanté (a.k.a) Jon Snow from Sleeping With Books

As with previous volumes in the Wheel of Time series, Macmillan is making the prologue for Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson’s The Gathering Storm available for purchase before the hardcover is released on 10/27/09.

In the prologue, titled ‘What The Storm Means,’ Rand al’Thor, the Dragon Reborn, struggles to unite a fractured network of kingdoms and alliances in preparation for the Last Battle. As he attempts to halt the Seanchan encroachment northward—wishing he could form at least a temporary truce with the invaders—his allies watch in terror the shadow that seems to be growing within the heart of the Dragon Reborn himself.

‘What the Storm Means’ is available for $2.99 as either an ebook or an audio download. You can buy the ebook from a wide range of online retailers, and it is compatible with nearly all e-reading devices, including the Sony Reader and the Kindle. The complete list of retailers can be found here.

I’m a huge fantasy audio book fan. I’m so busy these days that most of the time I listen to audiobooks rather than just read a book. I know, those who love the feel of books cringe at this . But, here are a couple reasons why I prefer fantasy audio books over regular books.

1. Huge selection of audio books

If a fantasy book becomes popular, you can bet there’s going to be an audio book out there (Can you say Twilight Audio books?). There are also quite a few good science fiction audio books are well.

2. Voice Acting

The best fantasy audio books (or any audio books for that matter) live or die by the quality of the narrator. If the narrator has some talent, the entire “reading” experience can be elevated to another level. Narrators use different voices and accents for different characters — this can really add a deeper dimension to the listening experience. You can often “feel” what the character feels if the narrator renders character’s voice expression just right.

3. Audio books are Cheap

Ok, audio books are normally pretty expensive, Audible offers very cheap audio books if you sign up for their membership.

4. You can store many audio books on mp3 players

With ipods, amazon kindle, and other such gizmos all the rage now, it’s easy to store as many audio books as you want. This makes audio books great for  traveling. Listening to books on that long plain ride ROCKs.

5. You Can Entertain Yourself While working

Yep. Audio books are my favorite way of passing “chore” time. Need to wash dishes? Vacum? Long ride to work? No Problem, just listen to your audio book to speed up time.

So there we go, 5 Reasons to listen to an audio book.