I read this book in about 2 hours, which should give you some idea of how much I liked it. (Hint: a lot.)
So, the book is set in an alternate Earth where music is magic and you can play music to do magic. Different songs are different spells (so "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider" is a spell for drying stuff, Beethoven's 5th Symphony is a spell for making a force field, etc).
And seriously, they use magic for everything. Want to move a trolley? Play music at it. Want to move a train? Play music at it. Want to grow a plant? Play music at it. Want to deliver people's cafe food? Play music at it. Your apartment's too hot? Play music at it. Have a cold? I kid you not, get someone to play music at it. As long as you know a song that does what you want, and are competent enough to play that song, how do you solve your problem? Play music at it.
But anyway, enough exposition. The main character is a twelve-year-old named Amelia Jones, who auditions for the titular Mystwick School of Musicraft. (It's 'music craft', not 'music raft', and it's the music-magic-whatnot.) |She fails|, which is played for laughs at the time (|her sending a plant-growing spell at one of her audition-judge people, causing his moustache to grow super much instead of the plant|). Nevertheless, she still gets into Mystwick.
At first, The Mystwick School of Musicraft seemed like it was going to pull the "Your Leaders Are Secretly Evil" trope, especially when I learned about "black spells": spells that are banned. (Normal spells have colors, which are green, yellow, blue, and white; don't ask me how.) In actuality, the black spells are banned for a very simple and logical reason: they're necromancy, which never works and tends to have unpleasant consequences like you dying. Mystwick doesn't use the trope.
Favorite lines:
"Only sixteen people in the world are licensed to teleport anything bigger than a refrigerator."
Page 65.
Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for mild jumpscares, a couple ghosts, and the main character accidentally burning herself on multiple occasions. Don't know how it would be a videogame, but I'm sure it could be made to work. Visual novel, maybe, or something more RPG-like. If someone managed it (and didn't royally mess it up), I'd play it.
This one joins Kiki's Delivery Service and The Adventurer's Guide to Successful Escapes in getting five stars. This also means I recommend it.
I like that the authorities are actually AGAINST the dark magic instead of just limiting who can do it, or at least, that's how it sounds. Also, music as magic is a really cool idea.
ReplyDeleteYeah, they're against it. It was nice having book authorities who are actually nice and have the best interests of their people in mind.
DeleteAnd I mean, if you did manage to get ahold of a black spell, you could theoretically play it (although it's against the law). However, as I said above, there tend to be unpleasant consequences like you dying.
Music as magic is a really cool idea. I'm glad you think so too.
I also really like the idea of music being magic. In fact I think it does have some magical qualities for real!!!! Great review, as always!
ReplyDelete- Grammy
It certainly is a cool idea, and I like how the author thought through what would actually happen if it were true (hence all the "play music at it" examples).
DeleteAll the main characters are improbable prodigies at a school for improbable prodigies, so they can do things like "arrange a nursery rhyme so it can be played on a very specific set of boomwhackers, all without any paper". (They don't actually do that, but there is a similar incident.) I have no conclusion for this paragraph.