Hello and welcome to the first post (officially) where I recommend titles! I decided to do something like this until I can finally snap out of my reviewing slump.
Which I think exists!
Anyway, this post is about books where the portagonist either enters a book, or a character from the book comes to life or jumps out of the book. I'll include titles I've already read and few I wish to read!
Between the Lines series by Jodi Picoult
Delilah is a bit of a loner who prefers spending her time in the school library with her head in a book—one book in particular. Between the Lines may be a fairy tale, but it feels real. Prince Oliver is brave, adventurous, and loving. He really speaks to Delilah.
And then one day Oliver actually speaks to her. Turns out, Oliver is more than a one-dimensional storybook prince. He’s a restless teen who feels trapped by his literary existence and hates that his entire life is predetermined. He’s sure there’s more for him out there in the real world, and Delilah might just be his key to freedom.
A romantic and charming story, this companion novel to Off the Page will make every reader believe in the fantastical power of fairy tales.
The book is one of the many which have been sitting on my TBR list. I'm looking still for a good paperback copy in Greece, before buying online. Alas, it's hard to find the English version and easy to find the translated in Greek expensive one.
I think this book is sweet and a 'classic' on this category. There is also the second book which has a beautiful cover!
The Librarian by Christi Sloat
He’s from 1892 England, she’s in a small library in 2017. And that's just the start of their troubles.
Emme never meant to stay in Maine. She'd come only to find a librarian for her Gram's library, a custodian for the collection of mysterious books she'd promised to protect. On a dark, wintery night, alone in the library, she takes her first glance into one of the antique novels and finds herself transported to 1892 England staring into the eyes of handsome and dashing hero Jack Ridgewell. As each chapter passes she learns you can truly fall in love with a character in a book, that book boyfriends are real and Emme must choose between the real world, and his.
When the last page is read he's gone and Emme feels the cold loneliness of lost love. Will she find Jack again, or will their love be forever lost? The answer lies within the pages…
This is what a book lover's love life looks like, if you could truly love a book character. I really want to read this book since it also carries a historical element and has a sweet cover!
The Book Jumper series by Mechthild Gläser
Amy Lennox doesn't know quite what to expect when she and her mother pick up and leave Germany for Scotland, heading to her mother's childhood home of Lennox House on the island of Stormsay.
Amy's grandmother, Lady Mairead, insists that Amy must read while she resides at Lennox House—but not in the usual way. It turns out that Amy is a book jumper, able to leap into a story and interact with the world inside. As thrilling as Amy's new power is, it also brings danger: someone is stealing from the books she visits, and that person may be after her life. Teaming up with fellow book jumper Will, Amy vows to get to the bottom of the thefts—at whatever cost.
This little gem is quite similar to Inkheart, yet the scenery takes place into many different books! The hook line of this book was at the beginning where Sherlock Holmes suddenly disappears!
Inkheart series by Cornelia Funke
Twelve-year-old Meggie learns that her father, who repairs and binds books for a living, can "read" fictional characters to life when one of those characters abducts them and tries to force him into service.
Characters from books literally leap off the page in this engrossing fantasy. Meggie has had her father to herself since her mother went away when she was young. Mo taught her to read when she was five, and the two share a mutual love of books. He can "read" characters out of books. When she was three, he read aloud from a book called Inkheart and released characters into the real world. At the same time, Meggie's mother disappeared into the story. This "story within a story" will delight not just fantasy fans, but all readers who like an exciting plot with larger-than-life characters.
I admit it; I saw the movie first, THEN read the book. I still need to finish the series though as also find the books. BUT, I am very jealous of Mo's ability to 'read' characters into life! Imagine what would happen if we could bring some of our favorite characters into life!
Here're few fine examples:
(Art belongs to the respected creators)
Off book by Jessica Dall
Twenty-year-old Eloise has learned all she can from the School, where characters live until joining their novels. No one knows genre and plot structure better than her, but despite her knowledge, she’s yet to be assigned to her own story. All her friends are off starting their lives with their authors—and if Eloise doesn’t get assigned soon, she’ll fade away, forgotten by all.
When she is offered a job at the Recording Office, instead, she takes the chance to write her own future. Suddenly living among the post-storied, Eloise meets Barnaby Fitzwilliam, a former romance novel hero who hasn’t lost any of his in-story charm. But just as their relationship begins to get serious, Eloise is sucked into a novel she was never meant to be part of, turning everything they thought they knew about their world upside down.
Now, caught where the only rules are made by authors and truly anything is possible, Eloise must find her way back home—or her life might end before she ever gets the chance to live it.
Set in an intriguing, unique world, OFF BOOK explores the story beneath the stories we all know and love, taking readers and characters alike on an adventure just waiting to be written.
This underappreciated book follow the struggles of characters. Authors create in their minds the characters they want, but what happen when the story ends? Where do these characters go? And if an author 'kills' a character, does this character survive to retirement?
The book is smart and funny with doses of knowledge in tropes and genres too!
The Accidental Turn series by J.M. Frey
Forsyth Turn is not a hero. Lordling of Turn Hall and Lysse Chipping, yes. Spymaster for the king, certainly. But hero? That’s his older brother’s job, and Kintyre Turn is nothing if not legendary. However, when a raid on the kingdom’s worst criminal results in the rescue of a bafflingly blunt woman, oddly named and even more oddly mannered, Forsyth finds his quaint, sedentary life is turned on its head.
Dragged reluctantly into a quest he never expected, and fighting villains that even his brother has never managed to best, Forsyth is forced to confront his own self-shame and the demons that come with always being second-best. And, more than that, when he finally realizes where Lucy came from and why she’s here, he’ll be forced to question not only his place in the world, but the very meaning of his own existence.
Smartly crafted, The Untold Tale gives agency to the unlikeliest of heroes: the silenced, the marginalized, and the overlooked. It asks what it really means to be a fan when the worlds you love don't resemble the world you live in, celebrates the power of the written word, challenges tropes, and shows us what happens when someone stands up and refuses to remain a secondary character in their own life.
Now THIS is a book lover's dream come true, but with the bad things that can also happen to you! Forsyth is a book character and through his eyes we see how Lucy Pip tries to survive into his world. This book is categorized as meta-fiction fantasy where all the tropes we love and hate in the genre come together in a masterful battle tearing at each other!
I'd seriously love to have this book as audiobook too, or a graphic novel!
The second book of the series is also about books, but a sinister evil makes all the existing books in our world disappear!
There are also novellas set in this world, with a good dose of LGBT themes in it! You'll never get bored with these books! ;)
Side note: the villain in this series is horrible, like Amarantha/Erawan horrible!
What do you think? Do you have any books which are similar to the ones above? Any recs for me? I'd love to hear from you!
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