Shadowmagic

Once upon a time John Lenahan was a magician. Then he revealed the workings of the 3-card trick, got expelled from the Magic Circle and began a successful media career, starring in his own BBC series, fronting a series for ITV and making untold other assorted TV and stage appearances.

He still follows that career but a few years ago he decided to write a novel as well. He spent several months, writing 1000 words a day, and then… Shadowmagic was finished.

Now I would not usually begin a book review with a potted bio, but this book is different.  You see, John quickly realised that the route to market is fearsomely tricky, even for someone with a substantial reputation for comedy and magic. So he decided that the best way to get his book out to the public was to record himself reading it, chapter by chapter, and then publish it on podiobooks.com.  Clearly, all his experience as a performer helped and within a short while Shadowmagic was voted number one out of the 300 books on the web-site and John had 20,000 subscribers.

And then the publishers started to call him.

Shadowmagic is still available free as a podcast. But now (for a reasonable £6.99) you can get your hands on an old-fashioned printed copy and listen to the voice in your head instead of John’s mellifluous tones.

So what’s it about? Here’s how John introduces it on his web-site:

“Hi, my name is Conor.  Other than my father being a bit of an eccentric lunatic, my life was pretty normal until I got attacked in my living room and whisked away to Tir na Nog, the mystical land of the ancient Celts, where it turns out Dad is the usurped heir to the throne and everybody wants me dead because of some prophecy.  Don’t you just hate when that happens?”

In essence Shadowmagic is a quest.  Conor is dragged off to Tir Na Nog, discovers the truth about his father, meets the rest of his family (not all of whom are friendly and none of whom are entirely reliable), makes friends with a banshee called Fergal, an Imp called Araf and an exquisite princess called Essa, and with their help, attempts to find his way back home, whilst, at the same time, being side-tracked into saving Tir Na Nog from an evil tyrant .

But what makes Shadowmagic such fun is Connor’s voice. The whole story is written in the first person and within the first few pages the reader realises that this particular first person is a cocky, somewhat glib kid with an inflated sense of his own comic genius, but also with an ability to smile in the face of adversity which can only come from a level of courage the reader would not expect. He is also deeply rooted in modern day culture and technology, which provides Lenahan with endless opportunities to play games with the both mediaeval and magical sensibilities of Tir Na Nog’s residents.

Add to this the fact that every chapter ends with a hook (That’s when the bus hit me. I had just met another member of the family. That’s why we didn’t hear him approach.) that lures you into reading the next chapter, and the next one, and so on until, breathless, you have reached the final page, and you have a very readable, very enjoyable and very magical tale indeed.

It’s out now. So why not pick up a copy? You won’t be disappointed.