Call number
SPEC MCG
Collection
Genres
Series
Publication
Tor.com (2019), 528 pages
Description
Fantasy. Fiction. Science Fiction. HTML: A HUGO AWARD FINALIST! WINNER OF THE LOCUS AWARD FOR BEST FANTASY NOVEL, 2020! A Pick on the 2020 RUSA Reading List!New York Times bestselling and Alex, Nebula, and Hugo-Award-winning author Seanan McGuire introduces readers to a world of amoral alchemy, shadowy organizations, and impossible cities in the standalone fantasy, Middlegame. Meet Roger. Skilled with words, languages come easily to him. He instinctively understands how the world works through the power of story. Meet Dodger, his twin. Numbers are her world, her obsession, her everything. All she understands, she does so through the power of math. Roger and Dodger aren't exactly human, though they don't realise it. They aren't exactly gods, either. Not entirely. Not yet. Meet Reed, skilled in the alchemical arts like his progenitor before him. Reed created Dodger and her brother. He's not their father. Not quite. But he has a plan: to raise the twins to the highest power, to ascend with them and claim their authority as his own. Godhood is attainable. Pray it isn't attained. A USA Today Bestseller, and named as one of Paste Magazine's 30 Best Fantasy Novels of the Decade! At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied..… (more)
Media reviews
Publisher's Weekly
McGuire (the Wayward Children series) puts a genuinely innovative spin on the magical child horror novel in this mesmerizing story of two gifted, telepathic children and an unsettling source of their power.... Shifts and alterations in timelines demand close attention from readers, by McGuire's
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rigorous pulls everything together by the end. This is a fascinating novel by an author of consummate skill. Show Less
Library Journal
McGuire sets a high bar for alchemy-based stories in this new stand-alone, twisting themes of time and space as seen through the eyes of children. Note some scenes feature self-harm and violence. Overall this singular work keeps readers thinking long after the final page.
Satisfying on all levels of the reading experience: thrilling, emotionally resonant, and cerebral. Escape to Witch Mountain for grown-ups.
User reviews
LibraryThing member quondame
A clever book and a painful difficult read for modern fantasy, with a good percentage devoted to the villains without developing them particularly. They are just ruthless bad either convinced their good or happy to wallow in evil. The twins of destiny are more interesting than many fantasy
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protagonists, and the body count is pretty high. Show Less
LibraryThing member Stevil2001
I enjoyed the premise of this fantasy novel: an evil alchemist creates a pair of twins to embody the Doctrine of Ethos. One is the power of mathematics, the other language, and they're raised on opposite sides of the country. Only they discover than can talk to each other telepathically, and they
I would say I was really enjoying it up until the point where they figure out what's going on, at which it kind of went off the rails. A lot of exposition has to be delivered very quickly, and it's very clunky. I felt like they accepted things too easily in some ways, and were weirdly resistant to them in others. And then the climax feels like the climax to an action movie, not a character novel, and is too dependent on what up until that point had been a pretty minor element of the novel (the novel within a novel, A. Deborah Baker's Over the Woodward Wall). Plus I didn't find the powers of the twins, once expressed, very compelling. "Math" seemed to boil down to "can do anything if the author can think of a number word to use"... but on the other hand, "language" was basically just "is very persuasive when speaking," which I kind of wanted more for. Like, wouldn't an understanding of stories be more interesting and apt? But in fact, the language twin feels like a dunderhead when it comes to comprehending stories.
I had a lot of nitpicks, too. In a great book you forgive nitpicks, but in a mediocre book, you tend to blow them up. Things that bothered me: Ohio is not in the Central Time Zone, I had no idea what the book meant by Roger's "New England accent, thick as pancake batter" (and I lived in New England nine years!), the details of graduate school and academia did not ring true (for example, no one would refer to their time in a graduate program as their time "in college"), and the excerpts from Over the Woodward Wall did not feel at all like something supposedly written in 1896 (for example, no one in 1896 would call a child "average" outside of a scientific context).
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begin a long-time, on-and-off sibling relationship that the book chronicles to good effect. There are times the cut each other off, times things get bloody, times they actually meet. Also, one has the power to roll back time, so periodically when things go horribly wrong, the book resets a few chapters and then goes off in a different direction.I would say I was really enjoying it up until the point where they figure out what's going on, at which it kind of went off the rails. A lot of exposition has to be delivered very quickly, and it's very clunky. I felt like they accepted things too easily in some ways, and were weirdly resistant to them in others. And then the climax feels like the climax to an action movie, not a character novel, and is too dependent on what up until that point had been a pretty minor element of the novel (the novel within a novel, A. Deborah Baker's Over the Woodward Wall). Plus I didn't find the powers of the twins, once expressed, very compelling. "Math" seemed to boil down to "can do anything if the author can think of a number word to use"... but on the other hand, "language" was basically just "is very persuasive when speaking," which I kind of wanted more for. Like, wouldn't an understanding of stories be more interesting and apt? But in fact, the language twin feels like a dunderhead when it comes to comprehending stories.
I had a lot of nitpicks, too. In a great book you forgive nitpicks, but in a mediocre book, you tend to blow them up. Things that bothered me: Ohio is not in the Central Time Zone, I had no idea what the book meant by Roger's "New England accent, thick as pancake batter" (and I lived in New England nine years!), the details of graduate school and academia did not ring true (for example, no one would refer to their time in a graduate program as their time "in college"), and the excerpts from Over the Woodward Wall did not feel at all like something supposedly written in 1896 (for example, no one in 1896 would call a child "average" outside of a scientific context).
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LibraryThing member forsanolim
This was emphatically not for me. I got around sixty percent of the way through the book and realized that I really didn't care for or about it, so I skipped ahead and read the ending. I'm not sure if it's worth writing a review, since I strictly speaking didn't read the whole thing, but I figure I
Roger and Dodger are twins created in a lab by a power-hungry and alchemy-obsessed Frankenstein's-monster-esque scientist; the two of them are supposed to, by complementing each other, enable the scientist's realization of some powerful alchemical Doctrine (with a capital d). Released into the world (on a tether) as children, Roger quickly reveals his gift for language and languages, while Dodger is hailed as a childhood math prodigy. The two begin to communicate as children via almost-telepathy, even though they live on opposite sides of the U.S.
Honestly, 60% of the way in I just didn't get it, and I didn't feel like reading 200 pages more to see if anything clicked. Roger and Dodger were cool, but I wasn't really very invested in what happened, and it didn't really seem like much was happening. Sure, it's definitely a dark book--lots of death and blood and fairly unsettling stuff--but it just didn't do it for me. I've been trying to think of why this was, and I think that at least one reason was that I didn't really come to care about the consequences of the plot. The author seemed to be purposefully a bit vague on what, exactly, our scientist friend aimed to achieve through the realization of the Doctrine/the use of the children--there were a lot of (recurrent) metaphors that didn't seem to really mean much. Also, I didn't really feel as though I ever got a good grasp on the rules of the world's magic (it often felt as though new magical elements just randomly got introduced), and it was hard to appreciate risks when there was absolutely no way to predict where things would go. I know that Roger and Dodger didn't really understand their magical potential at all, but it felt strange for them to either just exist, with magic happening around (as a result of) them, or to be told what to do to activate abilities they didn't know they had.
The best points of comparison that I have for this book are probably Ninth House, which I was so-so on, and The Starless Sea, which I absolutely adored. I picked this up sort of with the hope that there might be similarities to Starless Sea, but boy, I didn't see many (besides the cover). And Ninth House, while I didn't love it, had a sense of urgency in the plot that did pull me onward, unlike this one.
I have a few days left before I need to return this book to the library, so I'll hold onto it for now and maybe convince myself to read the other half, but I'm not super optimistic.
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might as well write something about it.Roger and Dodger are twins created in a lab by a power-hungry and alchemy-obsessed Frankenstein's-monster-esque scientist; the two of them are supposed to, by complementing each other, enable the scientist's realization of some powerful alchemical Doctrine (with a capital d). Released into the world (on a tether) as children, Roger quickly reveals his gift for language and languages, while Dodger is hailed as a childhood math prodigy. The two begin to communicate as children via almost-telepathy, even though they live on opposite sides of the U.S.
Honestly, 60% of the way in I just didn't get it, and I didn't feel like reading 200 pages more to see if anything clicked. Roger and Dodger were cool, but I wasn't really very invested in what happened, and it didn't really seem like much was happening. Sure, it's definitely a dark book--lots of death and blood and fairly unsettling stuff--but it just didn't do it for me. I've been trying to think of why this was, and I think that at least one reason was that I didn't really come to care about the consequences of the plot. The author seemed to be purposefully a bit vague on what, exactly, our scientist friend aimed to achieve through the realization of the Doctrine/the use of the children--there were a lot of (recurrent) metaphors that didn't seem to really mean much. Also, I didn't really feel as though I ever got a good grasp on the rules of the world's magic (it often felt as though new magical elements just randomly got introduced), and it was hard to appreciate risks when there was absolutely no way to predict where things would go. I know that Roger and Dodger didn't really understand their magical potential at all, but it felt strange for them to either just exist, with magic happening around (as a result of) them, or to be told what to do to activate abilities they didn't know they had.
The best points of comparison that I have for this book are probably Ninth House, which I was so-so on, and The Starless Sea, which I absolutely adored. I picked this up sort of with the hope that there might be similarities to Starless Sea, but boy, I didn't see many (besides the cover). And Ninth House, while I didn't love it, had a sense of urgency in the plot that did pull me onward, unlike this one.
I have a few days left before I need to return this book to the library, so I'll hold onto it for now and maybe convince myself to read the other half, but I'm not super optimistic.
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LibraryThing member SpaceandSorcery
Oh my, where to start in describing this novel? And how to do it without revealing too much and therefore spoiling your enjoyment the story? Well, let’s begin with the cover, one that would have drawn my attention even without the name of Seanan McGuire, one of my favorite authors, acting like a
The beginning of Middlegame might seem a little confusing, but my advice is to go with the flow and trust the author to carry you where she intends to: everything will become clear in no time at all. Even though the story is set in modern times, it shows some intriguing anachronisms: in the beginning we meet James Reed, an alchemist and at the same time a Frankenstein-like construct created by another famous alchemist, Asphodel Baker, whose dream was to harness the Doctrine, the fundamental force ruling the world, to shape it according to her vision. Baker never reached such a goal, hindered as she was by the Alchemical Congress, but Reed intends to continue his creator’s work – not so much to bring her legacy to fruition, but rather to gain absolute power. Reed’s way to make the Doctrine pliable to his will is to channel it in living flesh, embodying its constituent elements in twin children, each of whom will receive half of this energy.
Roger and Dodger are two such twins (not the only ones, though…), brought to life in Reed’s lab and infused, respectively, with the gift of language and mathematics, the two halves of the whole Doctrine. They are then separated and given to foster families, to grow as normal children until maturity will turn them into the tools Reed needs to wield. They are not normal children however, because their talents go well beyond the usual range to move into genius territory: Roger possesses an uncanny gift for languages, and Dodger plays with numbers as other girls do with dolls. One day, despite being hundreds of miles apart, they connect with each other, establishing a mind link that will indelibly shape their lives and their future, while at the same time mitigating in part their essential loneliness. As much as their creator and his minders try to keep them apart, to prevent them from reaching the desired peak too early, Roger and Dodger move through the years in a complicated dance of closeness and distance, friendship and hurt, mutual comfort and profound misunderstandings that will culminate one day in their actual meeting and the start of an unpredictable chain of events, involving time flow and the fabric of reality.
There are so many levels to this story that on hindsight I’ve come to acknowledge the fact that the core concepts of the Doctrine and Reed’s megalomaniac plans become secondary to the evolution of Roger and Dodger as persons: they are wonderfully depicted characters, their journey from childhood to maturity a fascinating progress that has little to do with their uncanny abilities and more with their sense of kinship, that bond which unites them from early on and is never broken even through separation and fallings-out. If there is a topic in which Seanan McGuire excels is the exploration of the human soul and the hurts children suffer as they grow up: Roger and Dodger are essentially lonely children, excluded by their nature and upbringing from their peers’ usual activities, always “on the outside looking in” and more often than not unable to understand the reasons for this rift.
There is a very poignant quality in the awareness of their isolation, which leads to the easy acceptance of the voice each of them hears inside their heads as the first contact is made and both children understand on some basic level that they have met their complement – the missing half, the part that completes them just as language and math, heart and reason, complete each other. Through them we explore the themes of friendship and family, of the connections we establish with other people and how deeply they can run, of the way our abilities can shape us and direct our lives. But above all we come to care for these odd twins and the way their respective orbits move around the center represented by their need to be together in order to be complete, and that’s the kind of story that compelled me to keep reading and made me resent every moment when I had to put the book down.
One of the reasons Middlegame is so absorbing comes from its peculiar narrative style, one that does not care too much about linearity and starts at what looks like an ending, and a shocking one at that: “There is so much blood.”, a sentence that informs the overall mood of the novel and keeps the reader mired in uncertainty about the fate of the main characters. From here the story moves haphazardly from past to future to past, the only navigational directions coming from the time and date given at the beginning of each chapter: such fluidity has its roots in one of the novel’s core themes, which is also an astounding discovery of the twins’ powers. I have often remarked how the vagaries of time can be a tricky subject where I am concerned, but here it all made a lot of sense, not to mention that it increased my perception of the stakes at hand, and just for once I did not care for the intricacies of time-hopping and its inherent contradictions because McGuire made it all appear so natural, so understandable in its very impossibility, that I could only accept and enjoy it.
The other characters in the story are truly secondary when compared with Roger and Dodger, so that the main villain Reed is not drawn too precisely, for example, although that turned out to be of little importance to me because in the end he was a little like Tolkien’s Sauron – a dire, evil presence in the background, mentioned but hardly seen. A little more definite is Reed’s henchwoman Leslie, another alchemical construct assembled from parts of dead women (which is a thoroughly chilling concept): her penchant for murder, mayhem and the suffering of others plays an interesting contrast with Reed’s detached cruelty. But the one who most drew my attention, in a strange mixture of dislike and pity, is Erin, the surviving half of another pair of experimental twins, and Leslie’s deputy of sorts: hers is an intriguing journey and one that I don’t want to spoil – discovering her depths and facets is one of the fascinating surprises of this novel.
Much as I always enjoy works penned by Seanan McGuire, I have to acknowledge that Middlegame feels like a further step up in her writing, plotting and character exploration skills, certainly the best book I have read so far from this author. Don’t let it pass you by, or you will miss an amazing story.
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magnet. That hand-shaped candle with the burning wicks at the end of each finger carries such an ominous overtone that I could not wait to learn what it meant – by the way, it’s a Hand of Glory, it features prominently from a certain point onwards, and “ominous” barely scratches the surface as far as I’m concerned... The beginning of Middlegame might seem a little confusing, but my advice is to go with the flow and trust the author to carry you where she intends to: everything will become clear in no time at all. Even though the story is set in modern times, it shows some intriguing anachronisms: in the beginning we meet James Reed, an alchemist and at the same time a Frankenstein-like construct created by another famous alchemist, Asphodel Baker, whose dream was to harness the Doctrine, the fundamental force ruling the world, to shape it according to her vision. Baker never reached such a goal, hindered as she was by the Alchemical Congress, but Reed intends to continue his creator’s work – not so much to bring her legacy to fruition, but rather to gain absolute power. Reed’s way to make the Doctrine pliable to his will is to channel it in living flesh, embodying its constituent elements in twin children, each of whom will receive half of this energy.
Roger and Dodger are two such twins (not the only ones, though…), brought to life in Reed’s lab and infused, respectively, with the gift of language and mathematics, the two halves of the whole Doctrine. They are then separated and given to foster families, to grow as normal children until maturity will turn them into the tools Reed needs to wield. They are not normal children however, because their talents go well beyond the usual range to move into genius territory: Roger possesses an uncanny gift for languages, and Dodger plays with numbers as other girls do with dolls. One day, despite being hundreds of miles apart, they connect with each other, establishing a mind link that will indelibly shape their lives and their future, while at the same time mitigating in part their essential loneliness. As much as their creator and his minders try to keep them apart, to prevent them from reaching the desired peak too early, Roger and Dodger move through the years in a complicated dance of closeness and distance, friendship and hurt, mutual comfort and profound misunderstandings that will culminate one day in their actual meeting and the start of an unpredictable chain of events, involving time flow and the fabric of reality.
There are so many levels to this story that on hindsight I’ve come to acknowledge the fact that the core concepts of the Doctrine and Reed’s megalomaniac plans become secondary to the evolution of Roger and Dodger as persons: they are wonderfully depicted characters, their journey from childhood to maturity a fascinating progress that has little to do with their uncanny abilities and more with their sense of kinship, that bond which unites them from early on and is never broken even through separation and fallings-out. If there is a topic in which Seanan McGuire excels is the exploration of the human soul and the hurts children suffer as they grow up: Roger and Dodger are essentially lonely children, excluded by their nature and upbringing from their peers’ usual activities, always “on the outside looking in” and more often than not unable to understand the reasons for this rift.
There is a very poignant quality in the awareness of their isolation, which leads to the easy acceptance of the voice each of them hears inside their heads as the first contact is made and both children understand on some basic level that they have met their complement – the missing half, the part that completes them just as language and math, heart and reason, complete each other. Through them we explore the themes of friendship and family, of the connections we establish with other people and how deeply they can run, of the way our abilities can shape us and direct our lives. But above all we come to care for these odd twins and the way their respective orbits move around the center represented by their need to be together in order to be complete, and that’s the kind of story that compelled me to keep reading and made me resent every moment when I had to put the book down.
One of the reasons Middlegame is so absorbing comes from its peculiar narrative style, one that does not care too much about linearity and starts at what looks like an ending, and a shocking one at that: “There is so much blood.”, a sentence that informs the overall mood of the novel and keeps the reader mired in uncertainty about the fate of the main characters. From here the story moves haphazardly from past to future to past, the only navigational directions coming from the time and date given at the beginning of each chapter: such fluidity has its roots in one of the novel’s core themes, which is also an astounding discovery of the twins’ powers. I have often remarked how the vagaries of time can be a tricky subject where I am concerned, but here it all made a lot of sense, not to mention that it increased my perception of the stakes at hand, and just for once I did not care for the intricacies of time-hopping and its inherent contradictions because McGuire made it all appear so natural, so understandable in its very impossibility, that I could only accept and enjoy it.
The other characters in the story are truly secondary when compared with Roger and Dodger, so that the main villain Reed is not drawn too precisely, for example, although that turned out to be of little importance to me because in the end he was a little like Tolkien’s Sauron – a dire, evil presence in the background, mentioned but hardly seen. A little more definite is Reed’s henchwoman Leslie, another alchemical construct assembled from parts of dead women (which is a thoroughly chilling concept): her penchant for murder, mayhem and the suffering of others plays an interesting contrast with Reed’s detached cruelty. But the one who most drew my attention, in a strange mixture of dislike and pity, is Erin, the surviving half of another pair of experimental twins, and Leslie’s deputy of sorts: hers is an intriguing journey and one that I don’t want to spoil – discovering her depths and facets is one of the fascinating surprises of this novel.
Much as I always enjoy works penned by Seanan McGuire, I have to acknowledge that Middlegame feels like a further step up in her writing, plotting and character exploration skills, certainly the best book I have read so far from this author. Don’t let it pass you by, or you will miss an amazing story.
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LibraryThing member electrascaife
I don't want even to try to give a summary of this one because everything is slowly divulged at such a nice pace in the book that I think you're best going in as blind as possible. It's a happily unholy mix of Frankenstein, A Wrinkle in Time, alchemy mythologies, and the best
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creepy-but-not-outright-scary bits of Stephen King, and it's an absolute delight to read. I love any story that makes use of the-will-and-the-word tropes, and although I didn't really understand all the math stuff (but I think that's partly the point), I love the similar approach to the power of numbers. All the characters were expertly drawn, and the relationship between Roger and Dodger is beautifully complicated. I loved it, and I suspect I'll be reading more McGuire in future. Show Less
LibraryThing member m_mozeleski
Ok, look. I love Seanan's writing in the October Daye series, but I wasn't sure if other series would be similar and different enough to also hold my attention.
I should not have doubted.
Middlegame is beautifully written, intricately plotted and I really fucking love it. It's my new favourite and
I should not have doubted.
Middlegame is beautifully written, intricately plotted and I really fucking love it. It's my new favourite and
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everyone should read it. Show Less
LibraryThing member carod
Middlegame is a stand-alone fantasy novel by Seanan McGuire. The author creates a world where medieval alchemists have continued in secret to modern days. Roger and Dodger are twins created to embody one of the principle alchemical doctrines. Separated at birth, they are raised a continent apart.
I have read and admired other things by this author. I especially loved her Wayward Children series and find the October Daye books great examples of urban fantasy. I have never been a big fan of horror books so I haven’t read any of the books by McGuire under her pseudonym Mira Grant. I read some of the press about Middlegame before it was published and I was intrigued, in spite of being nervous that it might be darker than I usually enjoy. It was pretty dark. There are Frankenstein creations, murderers and black magic. There are children in peril and a suicide attempt (triggers for me). However, this book also has some of the most beautifully written passages I have read in a fantasy. Mcguire’s compassion and understanding of lonely, gifted, nerdy kids adds so much to this story. The world building is rich (Mark Twain and Frank L. Baum were secret alchemists!). The way the book plays with time is interesting, but I didn’t find it difficult to follow the action. I did find Dodger a slightly more interesting and sympathetic character than Roger.
I would recommend this book to anyone who loves unique world building and well written urban fantasy.
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Nevertheless, they find each other and their relationship, through misunderstandings and tragedies, sustains them. Reed, the alchemist who created them, waits for them to begin to manifest their abilities so he can use them to achieve the power he craves. I have read and admired other things by this author. I especially loved her Wayward Children series and find the October Daye books great examples of urban fantasy. I have never been a big fan of horror books so I haven’t read any of the books by McGuire under her pseudonym Mira Grant. I read some of the press about Middlegame before it was published and I was intrigued, in spite of being nervous that it might be darker than I usually enjoy. It was pretty dark. There are Frankenstein creations, murderers and black magic. There are children in peril and a suicide attempt (triggers for me). However, this book also has some of the most beautifully written passages I have read in a fantasy. Mcguire’s compassion and understanding of lonely, gifted, nerdy kids adds so much to this story. The world building is rich (Mark Twain and Frank L. Baum were secret alchemists!). The way the book plays with time is interesting, but I didn’t find it difficult to follow the action. I did find Dodger a slightly more interesting and sympathetic character than Roger.
I would recommend this book to anyone who loves unique world building and well written urban fantasy.
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LibraryThing member rivkat
Roger and Dodger were created by monsters to try to control the fundamental laws of power. Together they may be the living embodiment of a basic universal force—which is why those who made them try to control how they interact, leading to bloody death. But Dodger can reset time and try again,
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when Roger tells her to. It’s a good standalone using elements recognizably McGuire’s—Jack Daws and the Page of Cups and drowned girls and themes about storytelling and archetypes—but without too much of the repetition that curdles easily into cutesy for me. Show Less
LibraryThing member krau0098
Series Info/Source: This is a Stand Alone book that I borrowed from the library.
Story (4/5): You can tell this story was very intricately thought out and it is very thought-provoking. I really loved delving into alchemy and thought how the story bounced through time was interesting. In the end
This book ends up being both a story about an alchemist trying to take over the world and a story about Roger and Dodger growing up with their strange abilities. There is a bit of a twist at the end which was absolutely mind-bending...I thought this was a bit over the top.
Characters (4/5): There are three main characters in this series: Roger, Dodger, and Erin. They are all interesting characters that I didn’t really like much or engage with. However, Roger and Dodger pretty much make the story. The are embodiments of a godly doctrine but they are human too. They are incredibly complex. At times it was really interesting to watch them trying to grow up with their special abilities in math and language, but at times it also got a bit long. Roger and Dodger also have a tendency to make the same mistakes over and over again which was frustrating.
Setting (4/5): For the sake of no spoilers we’ll say that this is set mainly in current day Earth. The setting was fine but wasn’t really a big driver in the story.
Writing Style (4/5): This book is written in parts. The parts aren’t necessarily in order as we go back and forth between one pivotal moment and the main story of Roger and Dodger growing up. It was cleverly done and you can tell a lot of work went into making this a clever and cohesive story. However, it was really long and parts felt really long. This took quite a bit of effort for me to get through and I am not sure if it was worth it.
Summary (4/5): Overall I have mixed feelings about this book. It was a masterfully written, very intricate, and very thought-provoking. However, it felt long and I didn't really actually enjoy reading it a whole lot. You can tell a ton of thought and effort went into this and it's also a bit mind-bending. I loved delving into alchemy like this but have never been a big fan of the whole time-bending concept. By the end, I found myself skimming some parts because it was just sooo long. Still it was cleverly put together and I have a lot of respect for the effort it took to think this all through and make a cohesive story....it is completely unique.
Story (4/5): You can tell this story was very intricately thought out and it is very thought-provoking. I really loved delving into alchemy and thought how the story bounced through time was interesting. In the end
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though, it felt a bit long to me and I didn’t really enjoy reading it a whole lot. I have never been a huge fan of books that involve a lot of “time travel” and jumping through time. This book ends up being both a story about an alchemist trying to take over the world and a story about Roger and Dodger growing up with their strange abilities. There is a bit of a twist at the end which was absolutely mind-bending...I thought this was a bit over the top.
Characters (4/5): There are three main characters in this series: Roger, Dodger, and Erin. They are all interesting characters that I didn’t really like much or engage with. However, Roger and Dodger pretty much make the story. The are embodiments of a godly doctrine but they are human too. They are incredibly complex. At times it was really interesting to watch them trying to grow up with their special abilities in math and language, but at times it also got a bit long. Roger and Dodger also have a tendency to make the same mistakes over and over again which was frustrating.
Setting (4/5): For the sake of no spoilers we’ll say that this is set mainly in current day Earth. The setting was fine but wasn’t really a big driver in the story.
Writing Style (4/5): This book is written in parts. The parts aren’t necessarily in order as we go back and forth between one pivotal moment and the main story of Roger and Dodger growing up. It was cleverly done and you can tell a lot of work went into making this a clever and cohesive story. However, it was really long and parts felt really long. This took quite a bit of effort for me to get through and I am not sure if it was worth it.
Summary (4/5): Overall I have mixed feelings about this book. It was a masterfully written, very intricate, and very thought-provoking. However, it felt long and I didn't really actually enjoy reading it a whole lot. You can tell a ton of thought and effort went into this and it's also a bit mind-bending. I loved delving into alchemy like this but have never been a big fan of the whole time-bending concept. By the end, I found myself skimming some parts because it was just sooo long. Still it was cleverly put together and I have a lot of respect for the effort it took to think this all through and make a cohesive story....it is completely unique.
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LibraryThing member g33kgrrl
This is an amazing, twisty, thoughtful, human book. It's a love story for 2019, the year that Good Omens to the world by storm with another non-traditional love story. This is a love story between a brother and a sister, but they meet and separate unlike traditional siblings. They have to learn to
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love and trust each other, despite differences and distance, betrayals, and being embodiments of fundamental forces of the universe. Not to mention a shadowy cabal that's out to control, use, or kill them. Show Less
LibraryThing member Glennis.LeBlanc
Roger and Dodger are twins separated at birth but at the age of seven Dodger helps Roger with his math homework and their friendship begins. With starts and stops in their metal connection due to the project that brought them about and placed them far away from one another they don’t become close
Digital review copy provided by the publisher through NetGalley
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and try to figure out what makes them special until college. What makes them special is they were created using alchemy in order to control the world. The project has been watching them all their lives and knows when they have been contacting one another and when they start making changes to their world using their newfound powers. But they are not tools to be used and now they are on the run to protect themselves from what is trying to claim their power. Digital review copy provided by the publisher through NetGalley
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LibraryThing member Charrlygirl
I'm throwing in the towel at 40%.
I like the story so far, I really do, but it's dragging. And I'm dragging my feet every time I have to pick it up again because of that. I feel like I've been reading forever and getting nowhere.
I fully admit this is my fault, not the fault of the book. Perhaps
Thank you to NetGalley for the e-ARC of this book. If I do go back to it, I will be sure to post a review.
I like the story so far, I really do, but it's dragging. And I'm dragging my feet every time I have to pick it up again because of that. I feel like I've been reading forever and getting nowhere.
I fully admit this is my fault, not the fault of the book. Perhaps
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I'll go back to it at another time. Maybe then I'll find it more of a fun thing than a chore, which is how it's supposed to be. Thank you to NetGalley for the e-ARC of this book. If I do go back to it, I will be sure to post a review.
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LibraryThing member jjmcgaffey
Wow, that is...rich, and complicated, and almost-but-not-quite horror (at least by my lights. There's plenty of gore, but only a little helplessness and that ends pretty soon). Everything from the concepts to the timeline is extremely complex and tangled. The chapter headings - each one close to a
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page of text - throw very interesting light on the main story (they're excerpts from a fairy story that really is related). The timeline resets, which we get to see partially, make things...not confusing, but definitely complex. Roger and Dodger are interestingly complex characters - there's a line, late in the book, about embodying basic concepts into people and forgetting that people have their own drivers. The line is not actually in direct reference to Roger and Dodger, but it definitely applies. And I'm glad Roger pointed out the part about "who do you want in charge of this power", because it's what I was thinking pretty much throughout. Their timeline is clearly not this one - there was not a devastating earthquake in Berkeley in 2008, for one - but it's solid and complex and real. This isn't like any others of Seanan's books (that I've read - I've avoided Mira Grant, I don't read horror), but then many of her books are not like any others. Worth reading, definitely worth rereading in a few years. It is a very long book, and the first part - their childhood, and the way the two of them leave each other at different times - drags a bit. The last third or half of the book, however, swept me up and I couldn't stop reading. Show Less
LibraryThing member fred_mouse
This is not a nice book, and most of the time, none of the characters are nice people. Arguably the two protagonists might be nice enough, but they do a number of shitty (and psychologically damaging) things to each over the many years this books covers.
But then, I don't read McGuire's books for
Other notable features: fascinating exploration of alchemical ideas, time loops, telepathic communication with unusual features, meta-textual features that both inform and confuse the story.
content warnings: so much blood, so much murder.
But then, I don't read McGuire's books for
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the 'nice'. My absolute favourite of their works is a horror novel, and which this one isn't quite horror, it gets awfully close. Other notable features: fascinating exploration of alchemical ideas, time loops, telepathic communication with unusual features, meta-textual features that both inform and confuse the story.
content warnings: so much blood, so much murder.
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LibraryThing member renbedell
A contemporary fantasy about twins separated at creation by an alchemist who wants to rule the world. The twins have special powers, one is good with numbers and the other is good with words. They also can talk to each and see through each other's eyes, even when on the other side of the continent.
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It is a very unique idea and gets good at the end, but it takes a while to get there. The book jumps around a little bit, which can make it a bit confusing. The world building is light, so the reader won't fully understand every thing that is happening. The book has moments that are too long. But I still enjoyed the book once I hit the last 25% of the book. It made all the slow growth worth it. Show Less
LibraryThing member Shrike58
So, my response to this book from when I first learned of it, until now, can be best captured by the term "sorta." In that I was sorta interested in it conceptually, but wasn't sure that this plot to gain control of the stuff of reality was going to be my kind of novel. This sense became more acute
Still, at a certain point, I decided that if I was going to give this work a chance, it was now or never, or it was going to be swept away on the tide to wherever unread novels go. Was it worth the investment of time? On the whole, yes. I think the backstory of the doomed alchemist Asphodel Baker is grand, and how that vision plays out is one of the things that kept me moving along. On the other hand, the protagonists Roger & Dodger, and their amoral creator James Reed, never quite captured my imagination; Reed being particularly annoying. I will say that my attention was most given a jolt when Reed's minions, Erin & Leigh, two women who will have very different fates fates in this novel, were on the page. There is no denying that there is a lot of set-up before you get to the last quarter of the story, when things do blow up real good.
The bottom line then is that were McGuire to return to this world I would be happy to read that book.
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over the past year or so, in that I've learned that novels best described as "gothic" in nature, and secret histories, really aren't my thing.Still, at a certain point, I decided that if I was going to give this work a chance, it was now or never, or it was going to be swept away on the tide to wherever unread novels go. Was it worth the investment of time? On the whole, yes. I think the backstory of the doomed alchemist Asphodel Baker is grand, and how that vision plays out is one of the things that kept me moving along. On the other hand, the protagonists Roger & Dodger, and their amoral creator James Reed, never quite captured my imagination; Reed being particularly annoying. I will say that my attention was most given a jolt when Reed's minions, Erin & Leigh, two women who will have very different fates fates in this novel, were on the page. There is no denying that there is a lot of set-up before you get to the last quarter of the story, when things do blow up real good.
The bottom line then is that were McGuire to return to this world I would be happy to read that book.
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LibraryThing member KatyBee
A twisted, dark coming-of-age story about a set of nearly human twins - there is dark alchemy, time loops, very creepy evil characters, and strange powers of mental telepathy. A very creative novel about very old themes.
LibraryThing member LisCarey
Roger Middleton and Dodger Cheswich areey two kids growing up on opposite sides of the country, Roger in Cambridge, MA, and Dodger in Palo Alto, California. They're both adopted, the same age, and perfectly ordinary kids.
Except they're not.
Roger's parents and teachers are impressed by his quick
Eventually, they both seemingly start to master their weak subjects. What's really happening is that they have started communicating in their heads, not quite telepathically but close, and coaching each other.
Roger and Dodger are the products of an alchemical experiment, the attempt of James Reed to embody the Doctrine of Ethos and gain control of the world.
They aren't Reed's only creations, nor the first attempt to embody the Doctrine--split in two, Math and Language, to make it controllable. Other pairs have failed to embody the Doctrine, or died.
Roger and Dodger are the other kind of problem; they weren't supposed to be able to make contact with each other so soon. That was supposed to be completely in the power of Reed and his assistant, Leigh Barrow, to control.
They break the connection the kids have when they are nine. They reconnect in high school, meeting at a chess tournament. Another break happens.
We alternate between Roger and Dodger, the actions and plans of Reed, and the stories written by Reed's creator, Asphodel Baker, whom he murdered. And gradually, Roger and Dodger learn just how complicated, disrupted, and disruptive their existence is--along with who they can and can't trust.
I really liked the characters, the way this fantastical story is woven into the real world, and, well, the fact that there is no victory without loss.
Highly recommended.
I received this book as part of the Hugo Voters packet, and am reviewing it voluntarily.
Except they're not.
Roger's parents and teachers are impressed by his quick
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grasp of and love for English, but frustrated by his struggles with math. Dodger's parents and teachers are equally impressed by how easily she masters math, and frustrated by her struggles in English class.Eventually, they both seemingly start to master their weak subjects. What's really happening is that they have started communicating in their heads, not quite telepathically but close, and coaching each other.
Roger and Dodger are the products of an alchemical experiment, the attempt of James Reed to embody the Doctrine of Ethos and gain control of the world.
They aren't Reed's only creations, nor the first attempt to embody the Doctrine--split in two, Math and Language, to make it controllable. Other pairs have failed to embody the Doctrine, or died.
Roger and Dodger are the other kind of problem; they weren't supposed to be able to make contact with each other so soon. That was supposed to be completely in the power of Reed and his assistant, Leigh Barrow, to control.
They break the connection the kids have when they are nine. They reconnect in high school, meeting at a chess tournament. Another break happens.
We alternate between Roger and Dodger, the actions and plans of Reed, and the stories written by Reed's creator, Asphodel Baker, whom he murdered. And gradually, Roger and Dodger learn just how complicated, disrupted, and disruptive their existence is--along with who they can and can't trust.
I really liked the characters, the way this fantastical story is woven into the real world, and, well, the fact that there is no victory without loss.
Highly recommended.
I received this book as part of the Hugo Voters packet, and am reviewing it voluntarily.
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LibraryThing member macha
i had trouble connecting with this one;about halfway through it started to move, but honestly all the way through it had way too many 'but that doesn't work' moments. interesting premise with the quantum entanglement, 'alchemy' elements, the alternate timelines, and the horror, but how these
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elements applied was vague and often questionable. at the same time the characters were just so stiff, and stubborn, and kept making the same mistakes over and over. and the most interesting character was not the two leads, but the third-billed Erin, who actually changed and grew throughout the book. and here's the thing: it was a very static world that never seemed real or engaging; even the writing was flat. i almost quit it more than once, and i never do that. i'm giving it a three and a half score for creativity, cause i'm nice, but i was tempted to go 3 instead as a failed work. Show Less
LibraryThing member Gwendydd
I didn't finish this. The story of Roger and Dodger was reasonably compelling, but the alchemists were such over-wrought, melodramatic bad guys that I couldn't deal with it. I like books that don't hold your hand too much as they build their worlds, but this one just throws a bunch of meaningless
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junk at you. Show Less
LibraryThing member jmchshannon
Middlegame by Seanan McGuire is weird. Dare I say it might be too weird for me. Part science fiction, part magic, part history lesson, and part feminist story, the elements do not blend well together. All of the characters are creepy, although I believe that is the point. When the story focuses on
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the characters, I was able to get into it. Unfortunately, when the story focuses on the allegorical aspects, it takes on an otherworldly quality that never obtains clarity. I know others love Middlegame, but for me, it is a little too esoteric. Show Less
LibraryThing member reading_fox
Weird fantasy as only Seanen can write. Distinctly odd it takes a little getting to but eventually the rules of the world become somewhat clearer and the story unravels to a definite conclusion. I'm not a big fan of stories that jump around the timeline, but this is cleverer than usual.
Dodger and
Dodger and
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Rodger (yes there's a reason) don't know each other, but one day Rodger hears Dodgers thoughts in his head. This is startling but as only young children can be he accepts his new friend and keeps her secret. He'd been struggling with his maths homework, and she knew all the answers, but in turn didn't find English so clear, which has always been his strongest subject. Apart but together when they need to be they make an easy journey through school. And one day Rodger doesn't answer when Dodger calls. But she's strong, she can persevere. Interspersed with this disjointed but linear timeline, we get scenes from other places. An alchemist (now or in the past) struggles to convince their sponsors - nothing to do with gold, but the embodiment of philosophical thought, and so slowly the story becomes clear. The chapter headings are particularly clever. Show Less
LibraryThing member Anniik
This book is one of the weirdest books I’ve ever read and I totally loved it. Explaining it in a couple of sentences is almost impossible, but basically it’s the story of two siblings who were created by evil alchemists to be the living embodiment of Math and Language. It drew me in from the
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very beginning and like most of McGuire’s books it was nearly impossible to put down. I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves weird fantasy/sci-fi (like me)! Show Less
LibraryThing member tuusannuuska
Interesting, well-written, well-thought-out. For all intents and purposes, this was a really good book. However, for me, it lacked pull. In the end I didn't feel satisfied, even though I wouldn't have changed anything.
LibraryThing member tornadox
It's got alchemy, twins, language, math, time travel, books within books, golems, and cuckoos. And so many references to the reading list of my childhood, especially [b:Night in Funland and Other Stories From Literary Cavalcade|2491454|Night in Funland and Other Stories From Literary
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Cavalcade|Jerome Brondfield|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1321854588l/2491454._SY75_.jpg|2498761], where I first encountered a Hand of Glory. (ETA: Having browsed through the book's contents, I didn't see this story at all. Must have read it in a different anthology. Night in Funland is still awesome.) Show Less
Awards
Hugo Award (Nominee — Novel — 2020)
Locus Award (Finalist — Fantasy Novel — 2020)
Alex Award (2020)
RUSA CODES Reading List (Shortlist — Fantasy — 2020)
Endeavour Award (Finalist — 2020)
NPR: Books We Love (2019)
Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year (Science Fiction and Fantasy — 2019)
Los Angeles Public Library Best of the Year (Fiction — 2019)
Pages
528
ISBN
1250195527 / 9781250195524