The Official Description: For his entire life, Charley Sutherland has concealed a magical ability he can’t quite control: he can bring characters from books into the real world. His older brother, Rob — a young lawyer with a normal house, a normal fiancee, and an utterly normal life — hopes that this strange family secret will disappear with disuse, and he will be discharged from his life’s duty of protecting Charley and the real world from each other. But then, literary characters start causing trouble in their city, making threats about destroying the world… and for once, it isn’t Charley’s doing.
There’s someone else who shares his powers. It’s up to Charley and a reluctant Rob to stop them, before these characters tear apart the fabric of reality.
My thoughts bit: Have you ever wondered what it might be like if your favorite literary characters came to life? You may want to rethink that wish because it might not turn out very well at all.
Charley was born with a unique gift. He can magically summon literary characters to life. When they arrive they are imbued with the characteristics that the reader has imagined… so it can be a bit unpredictable! Rob’s older brother has struggled with his relationship with his little brother now that they are in the same city. He’s torn between feeling as though he needs to take care of Charley and wanting his little brother to be independent enough to deal with his own problems.
This book is part love-letter to literary characters and part magical mystery. There are other characters dwelling in secret in the city and it becomes clear that someone else must have the same powers as Charley. Thus begins the mystery of where the characters are coming from and what they’re up to!
I loved the relationship between Charley and Rob. The characters are well developed and Parry has definitely managed a difficult genre expertly. It’s not easy to add well-loved characters to your novel and make them unique and still true to their original! Bravo!
You don’t have to have read Dickens etc to enjoy this book, but it will probably make it a lot more of an adventure if you have!
If/Then: If you liked these books, you will probably enjoy this one!
- Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
- The Magicians and Mrs. Quent by Galen Beckett
I received an ARC of The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep by H.G. Parry from Redhook Books via NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review.
Kinzie Things 