Book Review: City of Lost Dreams by Magnus Flyte
Published by Penguin on November, 2013
Genres: Fiction, Magical Realism
Pages: 368 pages
Source: complimentary review copy
Goodreads
That’s a nice girl, that. But she ought to go careful in Vienna. Everybody ought to go careful in a city like this. ~Graham Greene, The Third Man
If you could drink a vial of liquid that would give you immortality, stopping your aging at this very moment, would you take it?
The second novel written by Magnus Flyte reunites us with musicologist, Sarah Weston (no relation to poet, Elizabeth Weston), Nico, the 400 year old dwarf, Pollina, Sarah’s friend, and 13-year-old blind protegé, and finally Max, Prince Maximilian made famous from City of Dark Magic with his eccentricities and sexual excursions in dark bathrooms.
In Book 2 we find Sarah, Nico and Max in a mad frenzy trying to find a cure for Pollina. There is something not working quite right with Pollina’s chromosome 20 and she is dying right before them. Sarah’s roommate from City of Dark Magic, the gorgeous Italian, Alessandro, is working in the field of neuroscience at the University in Vienna. He knows a scientist who has performed miracles with patients who have chromosome 20 issues. So to Vienna Sarah goes. Meanwhile Max and Nico take care of Pollina at Max’s family castle-turned-museum in the last book and Nico continues to track down a way to end his bugged curse of immortality.
Many threads of story line are created in City of Lost Dreams. At times the characters were more numerous than the words it seemed like. This novel had elements of most all genres; well, except the American western ~ I don’t recall any cowboys in City of Lost Dreams! But there is fantasy, sexual escapades, time travel, science, love ~ of friends and romantic love and so much history! Vienna is a city flooded with history!
I’m not sure if it was because I had to read this one in small pockets of time or if it was just that so much was going on in the novel, but I found it hard to keep track of who was where and what was whom. The charm and charisma from the first novel seemed to be discombobulated. Max and Sarah were separate in this novel so the sexually charged banter was not there. I fell in love with all of the characters in the first novel and their idiosyncrasies and how they got along together but found there were so many new characters that I was a bit frustrated. I still enjoyed City of Lost Dreams, very much so. Nico is by far the most entertaining character and probably most developed one as well ~ I can see the magnificent Magnus Flyte giving Nico his own series at some point ~ he’s certainly done a lot of living to be 400 years old!
Magnus Flyte has certainly created a series that busts out of conformity which I find quite refreshing. The wild break-neck-speed ride that these novels take you on is sweet reader confection! I do recommend you read City of Dark Magic prior to City of Lost Dreams ~ you’ll miss out on the crazy, sexy, cool meeting of Max and Sarah otherwise. Recommended for anyone who enjoyed A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness, the Pendergast series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, or The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Turn off your phone, hide out from the kiddies and significant others, pour a deliciously decadent drink and enjoy City of Lost Dreams!
*sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll all play a part ~ ok, maybe more like Mozart instead of ZZ Top, but still, this book is for adults.