Night’s Daughter is The Magic Flute (Mozart’s Opera), MZB style. It is a fantasy- sorcery, magic, and halflings abound, as well as the struggle between good and evil. Pamina, Tamino, Papagino, and Papagina discover their best selves, and learn to use all they were given to interact with the changing world around them.
I’ve never seen The Magic Flute, so I can’t compare it. Night’s Daughter was hard to get into. It started fairly slow, summing up great periods of time into a very short introduction. But it is soon captivating, and something I plan to read again, because I’m sure I missed so much. It’s a pretty nifty little story
Perhaps the best thing is the author’s note. MZB speaks about the difference between reality, science fiction, and fantasy. The quote in the ‘extended entry’ is from the author’s note, as I thought it was so cool.

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Rediscovery is part of the Darkover Series, by Marian Zimmer Bradley. Terrans (Earth-born humans) searching the universe for a colonizable planet find Darkover, and realize that the people there are from a lost colony of early human space explorers. This is a very important book in the series, as it ties Darkoverans back to their earthy home. For some Terrans, being among the Comyn helps them use and train their laran, which most of them were unaware of possessing. These first interactions sets the stage for future interaction between Terrans that Darkoverans.
It was an interesting book. I’ve gotten used to Darkover novels having no contiuance of character or story other than hereditary struggles or genealogical myth. But in the novels discussing the Free Amazons and the Terrans, there are so many common characters that you get the type of story continuance that I would have loved in the novels about The Founding and The Age of Chaos. It’s a little disconcerting after convincing myself that one story about a person, family, or situation was all I was going to get. Ever.
MZB is one of my favorite authors. This is the first I’ve read of Mercedes Lackey. I do recommend this book, especially if you have interest in reading the Darkover series, though I would start with Darkover Landfall.

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I enjoy reading Mary Higgins Clark. The stories are always similar…a young woman, intelligent, wealthy, and beautiful, has spent years recovering from tragedy only to be caught in the middle of suspenseful and tragic circumstances. But no matter what, I’m always a little shocked by ‘who did it’ in the end. In You Belong to Me, Dr. Susan Chandler, a lawyer-turned-psychologist, finds evidence in the two-year-old disappearance of a woman via her radio show. When everyone who Dr. Susan receives tips from turns up murdered, it’s up to her to find the killer and save herself in the process. Sound familiar? You must have read another MHC novel. So what?!? It’s still suspenseful, and I enjoy every one of her books that I’ve read.

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Okay, so we’ve all read it. Right? Right? I read this book at least 4 times in the first 2 years after it was published. I was even assigned to read it for 7th grade science. Obviously, there was a reason I read it 4 times. It’s a good book! And reading it just now, I had an even greater appreciation of the book with increased vocabulary from high school and college. After 8 years of watching the movie, I was shocked into remembering the book is so philosophical. Besides the basic plot, the constant barrage of technological and scientific history, and the somewhat comical description of chaos theory, make it a fun read. Just think of it! Freaks, geeks, and dinosaurs! (Okay, really, all of the characters are lovable- even the non-geeks.) Even if you hated the movie, I highly recommend reading the book. Just like most of Michael Crichton’s work, the movies are to the books as imitation crab is to fresh lobster.

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Or something like that. So, during a moment of inspiration at work today, I decided what my blog shold be. Want to hear the story? Good. I was making copies (lots of them), listening to MPR, and their book reviewer started talking about his favorite summer books. ‘I could do that!’ I thought “That’s what my blog should be.” So, I will be reviewing the books I’m reading, movies, relating books to movies,and probably also commenting on current events….but mostly just reviewing books.