The Paper Magician

Someone in my lady geeks group recommended this series and oh. my. word. I have not gotten so immersed in a series so quickly in a very long time, I mean I read the whole trilogy in a 2 days.

Ceony Twill arrives at the cottage of Magician Emery Thane with a broken heart. Having graduated at the top of her class from the Tagis Praff School for the Magically Inclined, Ceony is assigned an apprenticeship in paper magic despite her dreams of bespelling metal. And once she’s bonded to paper, that will be her only magic… forever.

Yet the spells Ceony learns under the strange yet kind Thane turn out to be more marvelous than she could have ever imagined — animating paper creatures, bringing stories to life via ghostly images, even reading fortunes. But as she discovers these wonders, Ceony also learns of the extraordinary dangers of forbidden magic.

Main Thought:

World building is my absolute favorite part about fantasy novels, and I especially love when its incorporated so well into our reality that it could potentially be happening at this moment; and this hit all the plus marks for me. It was so intriguing I still want to know more. Tell me how they learn to manipulate elements with magic, tell me who started it all, give me the history of this world you've created. That's what I want more of.

Pros:

• As stated above, the world building!
• The story was suspenseful and mysterious but in a light, easy to breeze through without getting weighed down with so much unnecessary descriptions way.
• The characters, oh the characters. I fell in love with them all. Mainly because they're very real, they had flaws and moods and realistic strengths, mostly all in the main character of Ceony. I loved that she wasn't a damsel but she also wasn't a spy ninja warrior overnight either.
• The small bit of romance felt very natural and developed over time instead of magically being in love after 3 days. Refreshing.

Cons:

• I don't like when well-built characters suddenly do stupid things and one part in book three was particularly frustrating for that very reason.

Overall, it was AMAZING and I loved every second of it and every one should definitely read it.