Widdershins, by Charles de Lint

I'll admit that I'm a big fan of de Lint's work, especially the Newford stories, and especially especially ones with Jilly Coppercorn in them. So naturally--seeing as how this is a Jilly Coppercorn book--I loved this one.

This is the story of how Jill and Geordie finally get together (and how Jilly is finally healed from the tragic events of The Onion Girl and her own screwed up childhood). It's also a story about responsibility--almost all of the characters have something to learn about taking responsibilty for what they do and about not taking responsibility for what is done to them.

Besides that, it's also exciting. There's a war shaping up between the native Animal People and the Fairies. Unfortunately, this brings up the only problem I have with the book and much of de Lint's recent works. It's not a major problem, but I'll still mention it anyway. He has a need to constantly bring out the "big guns." Lately a lot of the action has focused on the super powerful spirit being like the Animal People and fairies, especially the uber powerful ones like Raven and the Crow Girls. It's not really a bad thing, but if you want a story where a person struggles against adversity, it's probably more realistic if they on't have a bunch of god-like beings as friends.

Still, this is a great book. I give Widdershins a full five yo-yos.

Thriller, edited by James Patterson

The main reason I bought the Thriller anthology is because it contains a Repairman Jack short story. As a rule, I don't read a lot of books that would be classified as a thriller. Still, I largely enjoyed this collection.

I won't get into detail on each story, but I will point out some of the high- (and low-)points. I like F. Paul Wilson's "Interlude at Duane's," but then I like most of his Repairman Jack stories. J. A. Konrath's "Epitaph," was pretty damn good, too. I like Heather Graham's "The Face in the Window," because it was suspenseful.There were some vaguely supernatural elements in David Dun's "Spirit Walker," which makes it border-line fantasy. I really liked Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child's "Gone Fishing." The only story I didn't like so much was Dennis Lynds' "Success of Mission," and even that wasn't bad; it just felt out of place, because it was written in the sixties and the other stories were written specifically for this anthology.

Over all, I highly recommend this book. I give Thriller four yo-yos.

Politics of the Imagination, by Colin Bennett

I'm really not sure what to say about Politics of the Imagination: The Life, Work and Ideas of Charles Fort. Despite its title, it's not really a biography of Charles Fort. It's more of an analysis of his ideas and their place in modern society, especially in relation to how science and the moder, consumer culture are trying to destroy imagination (or something). To be honest, I'm not entirely certain that I grasped the book. It kind of confused me, so, despite the fact that I liked it, I'm not actually going to rate it. I'll just say that it was certainly enlightening.