review and tour: random magic by sasha soren

Random Magic is a very descriptive book with many curious characters. It’s also filled with many puns and little jokes related to other books (and other elements of pop culture) readers are likely familiar with. Random Magic’s action doesn’t really get started until the second chapter when Henry encounters Professor Random shortly after the professor has misplaced Alice. Yes, that’s Alice from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Since Henry thinks Professor Random is a bit nutty, he plays along with the whole book-jumping thing the professor says he must do in order to bring back Alice. Unfortunately for Henry, this is one thing the scatter-brained professor is actually right about; but there is a bit of a mishap—Random had Henry jump into the wrong book! And so the adventure begins.

In the middle of Random Magic, I decided I needed to read Lewis Carroll’s Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It helped immensely as there are many parallels; indeed, some of the scenes in Random Magic are right out of Alice. The plot’s intriguing, though the book-jumping does immediately spark comparison to Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series. Some of the essentials get lost in all the extraneous descriptions and minor characters who, although humorous, don’t seem to propel the story forward.
3/5
In addition to my author interview, there are a number of other extras and reviews for this tour. All of them are linked at this site.