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Islands and Wormworlds
Dec. 12th, 2025 12:59 pmThe Island of Eternal Love by Daina Chaviano is a multi-strand story, charting the lives of various families that all have a connection to Cuba. In the 1990s, Cecilia meets a mysterious old woman in a bar and listens to the tale of her ancestors, while also investigating the appearances of a ghostly house in Miami, the city where she lives.
I do like a multi-generational family saga - but I found it a bit difficult to connect to this one. I wasn't all that keen on Cecilia as a protagonist, and the various strands of the story felt to disparate and remote to form a cohesive whole. The inclusion of the supernatural aspects took me by surprise and felt a bit jarring, as well. It was also pretty grim in places, especially dealing with what happened to a lot of the female characters.
It did all come together by the end, and I enjoyed it overall, but the final twist was a bit cliched and the book didn't feel wholly satisfying to me. I did learn a lot about Cuba, though, which was all very interesting.
The Wormworld Saga by Daniel Lieske is a middle-grade comic book series, which follows Jonas through a glowing painting in his grandmother's attic to a strange world full of monsters. He is told he is the prophesied saviour, who is tasked with stopping an ancient evil from escaping its prison.
It took a while for me to get fully into the story, which I definitely did by the end of volume 4 - and it went to some very interesting places after that. There are certainly a lot of different narrative layers due to play in in future instalments!
I liked a lot of the characters and some of the art is absolutely gorgeous. I also liked the presentation of Jonas' panic disorder and the way this presented obstacles to his quest, despite him being seemingly invulnerable to harm in the alternate world.
I do like a multi-generational family saga - but I found it a bit difficult to connect to this one. I wasn't all that keen on Cecilia as a protagonist, and the various strands of the story felt to disparate and remote to form a cohesive whole. The inclusion of the supernatural aspects took me by surprise and felt a bit jarring, as well. It was also pretty grim in places, especially dealing with what happened to a lot of the female characters.
It did all come together by the end, and I enjoyed it overall, but the final twist was a bit cliched and the book didn't feel wholly satisfying to me. I did learn a lot about Cuba, though, which was all very interesting.
The Wormworld Saga by Daniel Lieske is a middle-grade comic book series, which follows Jonas through a glowing painting in his grandmother's attic to a strange world full of monsters. He is told he is the prophesied saviour, who is tasked with stopping an ancient evil from escaping its prison.
It took a while for me to get fully into the story, which I definitely did by the end of volume 4 - and it went to some very interesting places after that. There are certainly a lot of different narrative layers due to play in in future instalments!
I liked a lot of the characters and some of the art is absolutely gorgeous. I also liked the presentation of Jonas' panic disorder and the way this presented obstacles to his quest, despite him being seemingly invulnerable to harm in the alternate world.
