I am absolutely exhausted! I did not do anything yesterday after work except take a bath and read this book. Man, they really should have kept these Edward Gorey covers, I mean REALLY. I forgot that some of them had these back images and I found this on Google image search today. The thing about these John Bellairs books is that someone in the ebook sector has really gone above and beyond, because the ebook doesn't end at just the end of whatever book you've just read. There's at least three chapters of the NEXT book following the ending, so then you'll get enough into it that you have to go get the next one. (I have also fallen for this trap because it will not mark the book as finished until you read the excerpt from the next book in the series). I have to say that I was not intrigued by the title of this book. A killer robot? I'm not interested. This is not just your run of the mill killer robot, though. This is a robot that is also a golem?? A killer golem robot? Golem might not be the correct word, because it's not like the scientist slash magician who created the robot blew the breath of life into the robot - he killed someone and used the eyes of the dead man for the robot, which also animated the robot and made it appear to humans as human. The robot could also be stopped by a magical key called the Key of Arbaces, which is more dynamic than just wiping the word off the forehead. Also this robot was created to pitch baseballs. I am not making this up. As with most John Bellairs books, the ending is not super satisfying. One of the villains dies a very convenient death at the end, after Professor Childermass pokes the golem in the back of the neck with not the Key of Arbaces, but a sword that we find out is enchanted in the final chapter. There's a contest here for $10,000 and mention is made of Johnny's family being poor even though a cereal heiress wrote the Dixons a fat check two books ago. Johnny Dixon, who spent most of the previous book in the hospital being possessed by an evil ghost, gets kidnapped TWICE in this book and I have no idea how this kid is keeping on. This was probably the scariest of the books, though the next one is The Trolley to Yesterday and I haven't read the beginning of that one just yet. Here's the full dustjacket to The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt: Full dustjacket to The Spell of the Sorcerer's Skull: And the full dustjacket to The Revenge of the Wizard's Ghost: I don't know if YA books still end like this these days, haha. I guess I feel like people are more discerning in terms of wrapping up stories and you can't just be like, the cane sword we got from the pawn shop six chapters ago is actually an enchanted sword! Surprise! I know for sure that no one is letting their kids go on harebrained adventures in which they get kidnapped all the time and then listen to their neighbor when they tell them not to call the cops. Johnny Dixon has so much ptsd at this point. HOWEVER, if you do like occult mystery solving youngsters in the style of John Bellairs, you will love Friday by Ed Brubaker and Marcos Martin! I don't know when the next book comes out, but I am impatiently waiting for this one! It's so good. Anyway if you like John Bellairs, Harriet the Spy, and mystery solving friends with fun names, you should check this out!
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AuthorArtist, essayist, divinity school dropout. Here for a good time, not for a long time. Archives
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