Inner-teenager rating of one of my favorite books at the time. ( )

Listened to this one - loved it! ( )

Oh, the joy of a Diana Wynne Jones book I've never read, at age 37! Howl's Moving Castle has been my favourite book for over 20!! years and while I didn't fall in love in quite the same way (my nickname at age 12 or 13 *was* Howl), I adored this book and the feeling of family I got from it. I loved the concept - paid tours of fantasy land - having read plenty of 'people from earth suddenly transported to a land of magic and dragons' books but never seen it run as a profitable (to some) business and from the point of view of those acting out the fantasy clichés. Absolutely full of wonderful, well built characters (as Diana Wynne Jones is so, so good at!) and I'm not sure who I liked the most. Maybe Sc...no, Kit. Or Lydda. Ah I liked everyone. Some well done scenes that are actually horrific in their own way, but done so that a younger reader could gloss over, very clever. All in all a brilliant read and I really did mean to do something else today. My mother in law is here in an hour and I really shouldn't have sat down and read a book non stop for the last 5ish hours...but I did. I regret nothing! :D ( )

I really loved the idea here and I've read a companion book (and found it pretty amusing). However, it was a sllllloooow slog. 500 pages and the story hasn't really taken off 180 pages in? I'm sorry. I don't have time for that right now. I wanted to get into it -- I absolutely adore her "Howl's Moving Castle" but I couldn't get into this one. And I'm sad about that. ( )

I absolutely adore this book, it is a hilarious, loving parody of high fantasy, while also being a fun adventure. The characters are fantastic. I would recommend it to any fantasy fan. ( )