Golden Butterfly - review
Magic is such a powerful thing, it works both as a craft and as a device, when it's written about with real insight and real diversion of perspective it is quite breath taking, I much prefer real magic that actually happens to that which is imagined as created for fantasy purposes. The underlying skill and effort and rehearsals alone are testament to an art. The ingenuity of staging and performing are also something special.
When we see magic, we believe in it, when it's cleverly worded to explain it, we still have a belief because the craft of it is the thing that makes it real. Seeing IS believing, so if the assistant flies or disappears and we don't know how and can't see how, we believe it's real because the art of delivery is so clever that it becomes real.
A few years ago I read a brilliant book about how magic was conjured by a stage magician writing a novel, It was a Bloomsbury book and I've forgotten all else, but it was fab. If you can deduce it and find it, do read it...
The arcane magic of fantasy is great, but like i said, for me the sheer no way, how did they of amazing sleight of hand and devices that manoeuvre our sight away from what we should see, is the best type.
Sharon has written a very magical book, in that we immediately want to see the act and yet the story is about the act, a mystery and trials are there and all the time, we are desperate as are characters within the book to know...what is happening...
We start with one of the greatest stage magicians of the late Victorian period, when to some extent it was slowly fading, perhaps to many had tried to stage themselves with copies rather than originals and the audiences saw too much. Like today the staging and setting up is the key to any great illusion or misdirection, usually mirrors and subtle copies are the key, here there is sheer cleverness and learning how to do things immaculately.
Our main characters are a brilliant duo of industrious and fearless teens, one an orphan the other a dependable ally, Luciana and Charley, they are superb. Their chemistry and endeavour are just superb.
I also love that Ana is able to do so much from having watched her mentor, her grand dad..the magician who has just died, she seems to have an inbuilt skill set, but where did she get it?
There is such a pace to this book, it really does fly, and flying is a very important skill, certainly if you are afraid of heights but maybe..it is needed for you to go up high... maybe smoke or pyrotechnics are needed and maybe you are petrified of burning from a deep seated past...
There are so many clever layers of discovery, all placed with utmost care by Sharon. She has crafted a mini masterpiece, one that would be amazing on stage and certainly amazing live, the feel of this story says see it...
We have plenty of background stuff, some we need to see properly and don't, I think that is brilliant, the art of misdirection is the greatest skill any magician has and so to a writer. Once we are on the perilous scenes chasing through gas-lit London on a search for the workings of a fabled stage act that seems to be very much sought after, we enter the sort of derring do of John Buchan and Conan Doyle, brilliantly done. Sharon is equally as inventive as Doyle and he was bloody good.
Our villain is a delight, he has all the facets of a real Machiavellian monster, he's also a stage magician himself... He is hellbent on finding and staging the fabled Golden Butterfly... and what is it?
Luciana saw it once, the last time it was performed and it was breath taking...
then her grand-dad stopped being a magician and died and the act was lost...
Or was it...
We meet some brilliant characters, there is just enough history of period and words used to add the layer of authenticity that sometime sis overdone and sometimes not done well enough, Sharon obviously can feel her way around times and places. The actual feel for the depressed Oliver Twist type of narrative is all here, a nod to social divide is also at play.
The theatre scenes are truly amazing, we meet the most wonderful characters, a mute magician and a stage hand and theatre owner who are just so in keeping with the actualities of the way things were done, we really need to understand things to do them properly and they just know how important getting things prepared and not seen before they are ready are key factors.
There is plenty of wit in the dialogue, even more dastardly doing and suspense, we really do need to pay attention to solve the puzzles and the clever, clever motifs are so visual in Sharon's descriptions...
We all crave a new Harry Potter or similar fave, I would 100% say discover Sharon and this book and await more and read her previous delights, there is often something in the saying, being the ones who saw it first makes you feel like you are the one discovering a special secret.
We aren't ever meant to know how magic is done, that's the secret, but if we are allowed to know more maybe we all become assistants to real magic in reality.
A dazzling book of suspense and thrills and worthy of every success, a true 10/10 and It's really just what comes next...
The book is due 2/5/19 get ordering and reviewing when you can, I'm lucky I have a back stage pass...
We hope that Sharon will tour and perform magic with her words...
When we see magic, we believe in it, when it's cleverly worded to explain it, we still have a belief because the craft of it is the thing that makes it real. Seeing IS believing, so if the assistant flies or disappears and we don't know how and can't see how, we believe it's real because the art of delivery is so clever that it becomes real.
A few years ago I read a brilliant book about how magic was conjured by a stage magician writing a novel, It was a Bloomsbury book and I've forgotten all else, but it was fab. If you can deduce it and find it, do read it...
The arcane magic of fantasy is great, but like i said, for me the sheer no way, how did they of amazing sleight of hand and devices that manoeuvre our sight away from what we should see, is the best type.
Sharon has written a very magical book, in that we immediately want to see the act and yet the story is about the act, a mystery and trials are there and all the time, we are desperate as are characters within the book to know...what is happening...
We start with one of the greatest stage magicians of the late Victorian period, when to some extent it was slowly fading, perhaps to many had tried to stage themselves with copies rather than originals and the audiences saw too much. Like today the staging and setting up is the key to any great illusion or misdirection, usually mirrors and subtle copies are the key, here there is sheer cleverness and learning how to do things immaculately.
Our main characters are a brilliant duo of industrious and fearless teens, one an orphan the other a dependable ally, Luciana and Charley, they are superb. Their chemistry and endeavour are just superb.
I also love that Ana is able to do so much from having watched her mentor, her grand dad..the magician who has just died, she seems to have an inbuilt skill set, but where did she get it?
There is such a pace to this book, it really does fly, and flying is a very important skill, certainly if you are afraid of heights but maybe..it is needed for you to go up high... maybe smoke or pyrotechnics are needed and maybe you are petrified of burning from a deep seated past...
There are so many clever layers of discovery, all placed with utmost care by Sharon. She has crafted a mini masterpiece, one that would be amazing on stage and certainly amazing live, the feel of this story says see it...
We have plenty of background stuff, some we need to see properly and don't, I think that is brilliant, the art of misdirection is the greatest skill any magician has and so to a writer. Once we are on the perilous scenes chasing through gas-lit London on a search for the workings of a fabled stage act that seems to be very much sought after, we enter the sort of derring do of John Buchan and Conan Doyle, brilliantly done. Sharon is equally as inventive as Doyle and he was bloody good.
Our villain is a delight, he has all the facets of a real Machiavellian monster, he's also a stage magician himself... He is hellbent on finding and staging the fabled Golden Butterfly... and what is it?
Luciana saw it once, the last time it was performed and it was breath taking...
then her grand-dad stopped being a magician and died and the act was lost...
Or was it...
We meet some brilliant characters, there is just enough history of period and words used to add the layer of authenticity that sometime sis overdone and sometimes not done well enough, Sharon obviously can feel her way around times and places. The actual feel for the depressed Oliver Twist type of narrative is all here, a nod to social divide is also at play.
The theatre scenes are truly amazing, we meet the most wonderful characters, a mute magician and a stage hand and theatre owner who are just so in keeping with the actualities of the way things were done, we really need to understand things to do them properly and they just know how important getting things prepared and not seen before they are ready are key factors.
There is plenty of wit in the dialogue, even more dastardly doing and suspense, we really do need to pay attention to solve the puzzles and the clever, clever motifs are so visual in Sharon's descriptions...
We all crave a new Harry Potter or similar fave, I would 100% say discover Sharon and this book and await more and read her previous delights, there is often something in the saying, being the ones who saw it first makes you feel like you are the one discovering a special secret.
We aren't ever meant to know how magic is done, that's the secret, but if we are allowed to know more maybe we all become assistants to real magic in reality.
A dazzling book of suspense and thrills and worthy of every success, a true 10/10 and It's really just what comes next...
The book is due 2/5/19 get ordering and reviewing when you can, I'm lucky I have a back stage pass...
We hope that Sharon will tour and perform magic with her words...