Good Reads

Jeff and I have recently finished our second read-through of the Fablehaven series by one of our favorite authors, Brandon Mull. The series consists of 5 books:

...and they are fantastic. We love reading together, and these have remained our favorites. We've also read Mull's "The Candy Shop War" and "The Beyonders: A World Without Heroes" Well, to be accurate, we listened  to The Beyonders, but that's the same thing.

Last week, the second book in the Beyonders series came out!

Naturally, we started reading it together immediately. It took a few pages to realize that maybe instead of re-reading the Fablehaven series, we should have re-read the first Beyonders book. It became apparent when one of the main characters was reintroduced and we looked at each other and said "Who's that guy?"
So we're trying to catch up as we go. There's also a sequel to The Candy Shop War coming out this year, but it's supposed to be more episodic than serial, so I'm not as worried about re-reading the first one before diving into the second. I'm pretty sure that info is legit, too. It came straight from Brandon Mull. When we met him. He was doing a book signing at the Orem Library a couple of months ago and we had the chance to talk to him for a few minutes. Turns out, he's a rad dude. He was excited that we loved his books so much, especially considering the fact that we were childless adults with no other motivation to read them besides our own interest in them. He asked us a few questions about who we are and what we do, he was genuinely interested in us and seemed so happy to be talking with fans of his work. He was equally gracious to everyone else, of course, but it was really great that he took an interest in us. It also helped that I was primarily there to see my high school buddy/published author Tyler Whitesides, who has become a good friend of Brandon Mull's as they've been running in the same circles in the same profession. I mentioned that I knew Ty and that's kinda when our conversation took off. I do think that he liked us for who we are, though, just to be clear. I had wanted to tell him for years that I really appreciated the witty, believeable dialogue in the Fablehaven series, and felt like so many other young adult fiction novels had the cheesiest dialogue (which is my major complaint with them), so Fablehaven was all the more impressive to me because of it. He was really appreciative of that compliment, I think because it was really specific feedback and he appreciates that in general.


 So here's my friend Tyler (Ty, as I knew him) Whitesides, and his two novels:

I'm still reading the first one, and the second one comes out September 4th. I can't give it a full review yet, since I  haven't read it all the way through, but I suspect it'll be good :)


It was also SO GREAT to see my friend Ty. After the book signing we went to lunch and caught up/reminisced. I was so surprised and happy that he had remembered so many things that we had done together in high school, and remembered us being really close friends. I had thought so, but it was nice to hear that he did too. He's just such a great person, and I'm so happy for his success.


What have you been reading lately? Have any of you read and Brandon Mull or Tyler Whitesides?