Magic or Madness

There are lots of books out there that deal with magic and madness and sometimes both of them together. What makes Larbalestier’s book so different are her characters. When I first started reading the book and “met” Reason for the first time, I thought her as very young and very naive. In

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fact, there was this sense of detachment when I looked at the world through her eyes. While the older me knew that much of what her mother had told her about her grandmother might have been untrue, I could not help but be swayed from this belief by the strength of Reason’s determination to believe in her mother. There’s Tom, who is so unlike all the heroes I’ve come across that I might have read the book for him alone. He thinks in fashion – his magic is fashion. Jay-Tee, whose better nature leads her to help Reason even though doing so would get her nothing but grief. And the creepiest villain so far – Mr. Blake. This is the first book so you don’t get much of a sense of the adults – Sarafina, Mere and Mr. Blake have been hued (deliberately) vaguely so the reader gets a sense of the person but not the person wholly. What I found most fascinating about this story is Reason herself. For instance, I am never quite sure how old she is. The sense I got initially was around twelve but she fibs that she’s fifteen and somehow the subject of age is never broached again. She doesn’t react in the typical ways – anger, fear – emotions for her are not solid colours but prismatic. JT thinks Reason is naive when she is anything but. She’s like an onion that you can peel to find continuous layers of – discover something different about. And the story – the promised thrill of magic is blanketed by the sobering fact that using magic has dire consequences just as not using it does. In fact, the entire story presents a morally gray area, letting the reader decide how to feel about whom without guiding them. And I appreciate the liberty to do. With Magic or Madness, Justine Larbalestier presents readers with a tale that allows them to feel the extremes of heat and cold, to both fear and cheer for the protagonists. She allows the reader to experience characters that are imbued with details and a rich complexity that lingers long after the last page has been turned.

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Premature death or madness. One of these fates awaits fifteen-year-old Reason Cansino. Reason's mother, Sarafina, has gone mad from not using magic, while her grandmother, Esmerelda, a "witch," has so far cheated death by living into her mid-forties. Can Reason save her mother? Her friends Jay-Tee

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and Tom? Herself? Can she trust Esmerelda? In the first of three novels, Larbalestier introduces a world of magic where to use the power is as suicidal as not to use it, promising many moral and philosophical dilemmas to come. However, this novel gets bogged down at times in establishing Reason's disorientation in New York City and Jay-Tee's confusion over Reason's Australian vocabulary. Danny's character as well seems added in here because he will be important later. Still, a strong fantasy that promises a stronger sequel. (Gr. 7 & up)

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I opened this for some light bedtime reading and couldn't go to sleep until I finished. Only through great will and the late hour did I manage not to open the second right away. Interesting premise and fun writing.

I opened this for some light bedtime reading and couldn't go to sleep until I finished. Only through great will and the late hour did I manage not to open the second right away. Interesting premise and fun writing.

Reason is no ordinary child. She has been on the move with her mother her whole life until her mother has a nervous(?) breakdown. Now her grandmother, who she always been told to beware of is now her guardian. When Reason goes through a door in her grandmothers house and goes from austalia to

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Grenwich village in NYC, she starts to learn the truth about herself and her family.
the hyper pace of this first volume in a trilogy is continued in the next two books and the anticipation to follow up each book mirrors the frantic pace of Reason's story.

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I loved it!! Read it in one day, couldn't put it down. Excited to read the next two books in this trilogy! Something different. I love the "magic" side of the book, and trying to figure out what the main characters magic was!! Great quick read.

The names in this book were wonderful! Reason discovers that magic is real and is learning how to deal with it.

This is a YA book but I was completely enthralled. I like all books that have to do with magic or witches but this book takes the cake.

I don't usually do a synopsis but here's a short one: Reason and her mother Sarafina are on the run from Reason's grandmother Esmerelda. However, when Sarafina

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goes crazy, Reason is placed with her grandmother. Nothing about Esmerelda's home in Syndey, Australia is what she expected and when she walks through the back door and ends up in New York City, she has to face the facts. Magic is real.

This book takes place in Australia AND the US and when Reason, who has never been outside of Australia before, ends up in the US, you can just imagine how strange it must be for her. She goes from summer to winter, day time to night time, Tuesday to Monday. The New Yorkers speak English but it's a different English and often she finds herself asking what something means or explaining what she is saying. I found this part of the book extremely interesting. It was neat to think about what a foreigner would think of North America. It reminded me of when my Floridian cousin first saw snow.

I am beyond happy to see that this in but book one in the trilogy! I am off to find book 2 as I can't wait to know what happens next.

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Reason and her mother have spent their lives feral in the Austrian outback, avoiding cities and never staying in one place for very long. When her mother has a violent breakdown, Reason is ferried off the the very Grandmother they'd been fleeing. When Reason sneaks through a door in her

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Grandmother's house and is transported to a wintery New York, everything her mother taught her seems proved a lie. Magic does exist. It is dangerous. And there are bad people out there who will try to use her.
I enjoyed the strong Australian voices in this story, which alternates between three main characters, reason, Tom, another Sydney teen, and JT, an runaway in New York. The magic system is original and interesting, and I'm interested in following Reason, Tom adn JT as they learn more about it. Esmerelda, the beautiful and young grandmother is creepy enough to add a good sense of tension.

I did feel that this was a set up for a denser book - while the story did stand alone, I think that the second and third books in the trilogy might be more story and less groundwork.

I think that Australian/New York expressions were highlighted a little too much- readers would notice the little differences without characters mentioning them all the time.

I'd give this to people who like fantasy, enjoy hearing Australian voices, or like family gothic stories.

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From the Sydney, Australia home of a grandmother she believes is a witch, fifteen-year-old Reason Cansino is magically transported to New York City, where she discovers that friends and foes can be hard to distinguish.

Book 1 Magic or Madness Trilogy

Magic or madness...which would you choose? This first book in this series sets the stage with strange family relationships, mysteries galore, loyal friendships and enough food references to make you hungry.

Magic or Madness begins the story of Reason, named so that her mother could deny the existence of magic to her very core. Fifteen years later, Reason's mother has been confined to a mental hospital in Sydney and Reason has found herself living with her grandmother - the source of many horrific

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stories from her mother.

And she's found out magic is very real.

This book spends a great deal of time setting up characters for the rest of the series. The story is not terribly substantial, but I found myself interested in knowing more about what would happen to Reason and Jay-Tee to reserve the second book in the series.

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Reason (what a brilliant name!) comes from a family with magic in its genes and finds herself faced with a choice of embracing it and dying young, or ignoring it and going mad. I wanted to like this book, as its premise was original and interesting, and on the whole I did. Unfortunately, there were

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a number of niggling irritants.

The narrator makes laboured, self-conscious use of Australian slang, and the editing decision to switch between Australian and US spelling and grammar was a strange gimmick. Plot wise, I found Reason to be tiresome at times; and more paranoid than her information warranted (even when she did turn out to be right, she really didn’t have enough information to justify being worried). On the other hand, this book set up a consistent and intriguing account of magic use and consequences, and skillfully established a palpably sinister ambiance.

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Enjoyable start to a new series. I liked the setting and Reason's character. The book clearly leads right into the next one though, so I don't think I can review it without reading the whole series.

A thinker's urban fantasy with Australian locale. The trilogy was extremely thought provoking.

Reason has lived a transient life with her mother, moving from town to town in the outback of Australia. All her life she and her mother have fled her grandmother, a woman who is evil, who believes that she can cast spells, who believes she is a witch. But Reason knows better, because her mother

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has taught her that magic is not real; there is no magic; her grandmother is not really a witch.

However, things change when her mother goes insane and Reason is sent to live with her grandmother in Sydney. Reason begins to question the things her mother taught her, especially when she steps through a door and finds herself suddenly in New York, and she is hit with the reality that magic is, in fact, real.

This book is wonderfully complex with no clear lines of what it means to be good or evil. The rules of magic are clear and precise and deadly, creating an already complicated world of traps and snares for the characters to maneuver through as they try to figure out who to trust and how to survive. Fabulous story, and I'm fascinated to see where the trilogy goes from here.

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Reason has been taught by her mother, Sarafina, that there is no magic, only logic, science, and of course reason. All her life, this brilliant child has been on the run from her evil grandmother. Esmerelda believes strongly in magic, and tried to teach Sarafina to do the same, but to no avail. Not

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long after Reson turned 15, Sarafina was drivin insane by the wicked Esmerelda, giving her daughter no choice but to give in and return home with her grandmother in Sydney Austrailia. After some serious snooping, Reason discovers a magical door that opens into New York! Maybe her grandmother was right all along! Maybe magic did exist! In order to return home, poor Reason must meet some very interesting people, go on some very intriguing adventures, and learn some very old secrets. This book is a must read!

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This drags a little in the middle, but the idea is great, and I love the whole front door of the house is one world and back door is somewhere else completely.

This drags a little in the middle, but the idea is great, and I love the whole front door of the house is one world and back door is somewhere else completely.

This drags a little in the middle, but the idea is great, and I love the whole front door of the house is one world and back door is somewhere else completely.

An uneven novel—parts are boring, a few tidbits are exciting or maddening (what do the feathers at the end mean? Ahh!), but mostly a pretty basic story without anything really standing out. Reason has been on the run from her witch grandmother her entire life, but is her grandmother really as

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dangerous as her mother says? (The answer, obviously enough, is yes.)

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A very strange, rich, confusing book. My view of who the villain was kept switching abruptly around - it was quite disconcerting. The obvious, cartoon villain was replaced by - lied to all her life? Then a whole new set of possible villains - who turned out to be one and a pawn...switch after

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switch. I wish we'd gotten more from Reason's POV after she went through the door, but I suspect that she really was nearly as bewildered as Jay-Tee thought. It's hard to upend an entire life's teachings - but she also got training in logic and reason, and when the facts contradict theory, facts win. She is, in many ways, very young - no "street-smarts", for either Sydney or New York. In other ways Reason is much closer to adult than either Tom or Jay-Tee - she's grown up being pretty much her mother's equal, not treated as a child. It's an interesting mix. One funny thing, for me - I had less trouble with the Australian slang than I did the New York variety (and there's no glossary for those!). It's most definitely the first of a series - the story ends at a turnpoint, not a conclusion (though without the feathers it would have been pretty solid). I'm interested enough I will probably seek out the other two, though it's not urgent.

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I love the way Larbalestier turns what we know upside down. Reason has lived her life on the run from her evil grandmother. When she's 15, her mother ends up in a mental hospital and Reason has to go live with the woman she was raised to believe is a cruel monster. While she's plotting to run away,

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she befriends a neighbor boy and then discovers that her mother had been keeping some important facts about a family legacy secret. I finished this in one night because I couldn't stop reading, and immediately downloaded the second book in the series.

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I found this book in one of my several TBR piles, and it is so old that the pages are yellow around the edges.

Reason and her mother, Sarafina, have been on a "walk-about" for as long as Reason can remember..... Now Sarafina is on her way to a mental hospital and Reason is on her way to live with

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her Grandmother (the evil witch), Esmeralda..... Reason refuses to speak, eat, or come out of her room.

Sarafina has spent her life running away from her Magick and her her mother..... She has filled Reason's head with stories of the evil magick that Esmeralda has conjured.... Now, living in Esmeralda's home, Reason searches for the truth and of a way to escape. Reason does not count on meeting Tom, Esmeralda's neighbor or passing through the doorway that takes her from Sydney to New York where an equally malevolent witch is waiting for her.

The book really held my interest and had enough of a "thrill" of the unknown to keep me on the edge of my seat..... The coming of age or the coming into knowing of her own powers seemed real enough as were the explanations of the abuse or non-use of those powers..... Although this is book I in the trilogy, I felt that the ending was complete and that I am not feeling compelled to continue the series.

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