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4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
1,639 global ratings
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4 star
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Middlegame (Alchemical Journeys Book 1)

Middlegame (Alchemical Journeys Book 1)

bySeanan McGuire
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Top positive review

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Kathryn Townsend
4.0 out of 5 starsThink hard before reading...
Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2019
It is well written and compelling and fascinating and...weird...

I hated reading it and I could not put it down.

I don’t think I liked the book and yet it is so wonderfully written, so new in its concepts, so much more than the same old same old we keep seeing in this genre it deserves acclaim. Four stars because, really, I am pretty sure I actually disliked the book and wish it weren’t in my brain but I have to acknowledge the quality of the writing.
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180 people found this helpful

Top critical review

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Kristyn
3.0 out of 5 starsThe book of "I don't know."
Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2020
Initially, I was drawn to this book because of its interesting premise, but unfortunately the execution just wasn’t satisfying for me. While the third-person omniscient point of view works in some respects here—particularly in getting inside the telepathic-like communication between Roger and Dodger—it ultimately falls flat because no one in the novel really knows anything. In fact, the phrase “I don’t know” is repeated so many times therein that I began to question why I was reading anymore. As a reader, I could relate though because even after 523 pages, I walked away with so many unanswered questions: What was Reed’s actual motivation all along, and why did he never actually act on it? What does it mean to “manifest” in the end? What is the “Impossible City”? Why write over 500 pages of repetitive buildup only to have the novel conclude in the short manner it did? Why was Roger’s gift and knowledge of linguistics not as integral (beyond just saying “do this” to Dodger) to the story? What is the point of the random, rather confusing excerpts of “Over the Woodward Wall” (beyond basing a spin-off series on them)? Etc.

In short, I wanted more from this book, especially given the length of it, but was ultimately left unsatisfied.
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34 people found this helpful

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From the United States

Kathryn Townsend
4.0 out of 5 stars Think hard before reading...
Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2019
Verified Purchase
It is well written and compelling and fascinating and...weird...

I hated reading it and I could not put it down.

I don’t think I liked the book and yet it is so wonderfully written, so new in its concepts, so much more than the same old same old we keep seeing in this genre it deserves acclaim. Four stars because, really, I am pretty sure I actually disliked the book and wish it weren’t in my brain but I have to acknowledge the quality of the writing.
180 people found this helpful
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Breanna Ramsey
5.0 out of 5 stars Be careful which road you follow...
Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2019
Verified Purchase
Full disclosure: I love Seanan McGuire's work, and can honestly say I have never read anything she's published - including her work as Mira Grant - that hasn't been outstanding. That has not changed with Middlegame.

I will admit I was a little hesitant about this one at first. I'm a huge October Daye fan, crazy for Incryptid and in love with the Wayward Children books, but this wasn't tied to any of those settings, and I had this irrational fear that I might be disappointed. Oh me of little faith...

Middlegame is a complex tale, and it's more than a little creepy. Roger and Dodger are amazing characters, and amazingly normal, even as weird things begin to happen. The villains are monsters, literally and figuratively, and Erin, well she's probably the most complex character of all. She's at times funny, at times melancholy and always, always scary, and in the end, I wept for her.

Middlegame is one of those stories I will be reading again and again, and I highly reccomend it.
75 people found this helpful
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E. M. Cadorette
5.0 out of 5 stars McGuire's best yet
Reviewed in the United States on May 28, 2019
Verified Purchase
I hesitated briefly to read this book, because all the reviewers I trust most were saying that it was incredible, but heartbreaking; I'm not in a place in my life where I seek out things to break my heart, not even a work of fiction, but I should have trusted Seanan McGuire.

This book is a mind-bending, time-shifting, paradox-handling fairy tale off-the-rails of a ride. When you are fairly sure you know where the story is going, McGuire twists the knife, does indeed wring the chambers of your heart dry, only to fill you with hope the next.

Don't hesitate, don't be dissuaded - this story may break your heart, but it will lift it, too.
60 people found this helpful
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Tess Monical
5.0 out of 5 stars Great book!
Reviewed in the United States on May 13, 2019
Verified Purchase
I loved this book. I'm a big fan of Seanan McGuire's work to start with, so I was expecting it to be good, but it surpassed my expectations and was AMAZING. I loved the super weird premise, the writing was excellent, and I most importantly I loved the characters (Erin and Dodger were my faves but all of them are dear to me now).

I am also very glad that the author had the major trigger warnings on her twitter- if you're concerned I would google it, I don't want to say anything specific here, but I personally was glad to have some warning about some of the heavier subject matter going in.
14 people found this helpful
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Robin Snyder
TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE VOICE
5.0 out of 5 stars An Improbable Journey that Will Amaze You
Reviewed in the United States on April 30, 2022
Verified Purchase
I’m trying to figure out the best way to explain this book and I’m definitely not going to do it any kind of justice. This is a strange and unusual tale, imagine if someone wrote an iconic book about 100 years ago and that book had all kinds of clues and keys in it of a place that could be made, by the right people. Then there is a secret society trying to make the right people, by weird and gross means that will be able to embody this iconic book and bring it to life so to speak so they can control the world. See not really doing the concept justice. It is kinda like if the cast from the Wizard of Oz went on a journey they didn’t know they were taking to bring the world of Alice in Wonderland to life. Kinda
“They were supposed to grow up with their hands in each other’s pockets, compensating for one another’s weaknesses, encouraging one another’s strengths.”

Roger and Dodger are twins separated at birth and sent to live with families at opposite sides of the country. They are not even close to normal children. They were designed in a lab put together with mercury and gold and other odds and ends lying around. They are two halves of a whole one the embodiment of language and the other math. Together they are perfect, but set to grow up apart they are flawed. They are experiments and they will have so many trials throughout their lives to make them into the people they need to be to bring some fabled doctrine to life.
“Words can be whispered bullet-quick when no one's looking, and words don't leave blood or bruises behind. Words disappear without a trace. That's what makes them so powerful. That's what makes them so important.
That's what makes them hurt so much.”

Roger is all words, he knows the meaning of so many of them, they are his friends and with them he will be able to do almost anything, when he figures out what he is. He started talking to Dodger in his head at nine and they have fallen in and out of each other’s heads throughout their childhood. They are linked in so many ways and while it takes awhile for them to figure out just how connected they are the journey they take is full of wonder and things that could be.
“Numbers are simple, obedient things, as long as you understand the rules they live by. Words are trickier. They twist and bite and require too much attention. He has to think to change the world. His sister just does it.”

Dodger was a favorite character of mine. She is so focused on the math, the numbers and the way they make the universe. She really was the least adjusted of the two siblings since words explain things to people in a way they understand while math just confuses most. But I love her interactions with the world and the way she can break things down sometimes into just facts without the emotional baggage.

They have a slew of people trying to keep them separated, more that are working to make them bring this magic world into being and only a few that will be on their side when the time comes. There are dangerous people who might just take them out of the game completely to give someone else a shot.

This story is strange and magical and different. It has fantastic ideas and metaphors throughout and I was so drawn into the language and the relationship of these kids as they grew into their adult selves and figured out how to travel an improbable road.
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LA in Dallas
5.0 out of 5 stars Like falling stars from the universe we are hurled, Down through the long loneliness of the world
Reviewed in the United States on March 17, 2022
Verified Purchase
I realized something about Seanan McGuire soon after beginning Middlegame. Lost children are at the center of most of her stories. To be fair, I haven't read everything that she has written -- she is a prolific author writing under her own name and at least two pseudonyms that I'm aware of. I have read all works in her Incryptid series that have been published as of the date of this review (17-Mar-2022). One of the central characters in that series is Alice Healy. Alice is the daughter of Jonathan and Fran Healy. Fran was abandoned as a baby, left with the Campbell Family Circus. Daniel, her and Jonathan's first child, was horribly murdered at the age of three. Alice was abducted shortly after birth, but she was recovered from her kidnappers. Alice herself had two children, Kevin and Jane, whom she abandoned shortly after Jane's birth. And there are other lost children in the Incryptid stories. I have also read everything currently published in McGuire's October Daye series. The theme of abducted and abandoned children is so pervasive in the early books of the October Daye series that it honestly becomes a bit tedious. When I first began reading the series, I would ask at the start of each new book, "Whose children are we abducting/abandoning/tormenting this week?" The most intense case is An Artificial Night, in which multiple children are abducted and tormented. I have not yet read any of the Wayward Children series, but c'mon folks -- just look at the titles. Is there any real doubt that suffering children will be centered?

The main characters of Middlegame are Roger Middleton and Dodger Cheswich, orphans adopted by families in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Palo Alto, California. Roger and Dodger are identical twin brother and sister. Of course, that is not a thing -- in real life identical twins are always of the same sex. But Roger and Dodger are not natural, they are two halves of one person created through alchemy. They are complements -- Roger has command of words, and Dodger of mathematics.

They establish contact at the age of nine. The alchemists who made them break off the contact, and it was at that point that I had my realization about Seanan McGuire and suffering children. Abandoned by Roger, Dodger is screamingly, brokenly lonely, so lonely it hurts to read. (This is powerfully written.) The book is, I feel, a deep exploration of loneliness.

Dodger is the main sufferer. Her mathematical gift cuts her off from making friends in the ordinary way -- Roger is her only true friend. As the story goes on, Roger and Dodger reestablish and break contact several times. Each time Dodger is wounded, broken. Roger has more ordinary relations with other people. However, we always sense his loneliness, too. He is not a whole person, just a half, and the exposed surface where he and Dodger were separated never heals and never ceases to hurt.

As I read, I was reminded of the Emmylou Harris song "The Pearl", whose final verse is a summary of the whole novel.

Like falling stars from the universe we are hurled
Down through the long loneliness of the world
Until we behold the pain become the pearl

That, to me, is what the book is about. Now, I will note that there is an intricate and well-crafted plot, involving magic, science, and time-travel (which McGuire handles in a typically sophisticated way). It's a rip-roaring story, which I enjoyed. But for me it was mainly a vehicle to show Roger and Dodger's relationship.

I'll add two minor points about the characters, one positive and one negative.

First, the main characters in the Incryptid and October Daye series are really good at violence. Each of them carries an arsenal (knives, guns, even grenades in one case) on his/her person at all times, and they are always ready to mix it up. While I can appreciate it in a story, in real life this is not something I admire. I was therefore glad that Roger and Dodger are not fighters in any but the metaphorical sense. So that is a good thing.

The less good thing is McGuire's depiction of Dodger as a mathematician. McGuire knows that math is not all about numbers. In fact, early in the book she writes this "That’s the thing with Dodger: she seems to think numbers are irrelevant to the process of doing math. What’s scarier is she seems to be right." Dodger *IS* right about this. Well, "numbers are irrelevant" is a bit overstated. Numbers are a tool used by mathematicians, but math is not ABOUT numbers, any more than home-building is about hammers.

Math is about Truth and Beauty. Yes, I know how pretentious that sounds. But to a mathematician, those are what doing math is about.

Unfortunately, although McGuire knows this, she doesn't understand or believe it, not to the extent of being able to make Dodger a believable mathematician. Dodger is consistently portrayed throughout the book as one with a superhuman ability to crunch numbers -- a kind of human supercomputer. So that was a bit disappointing.
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Kristyn
3.0 out of 5 stars The book of "I don't know."
Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2020
Verified Purchase
Initially, I was drawn to this book because of its interesting premise, but unfortunately the execution just wasn’t satisfying for me. While the third-person omniscient point of view works in some respects here—particularly in getting inside the telepathic-like communication between Roger and Dodger—it ultimately falls flat because no one in the novel really knows anything. In fact, the phrase “I don’t know” is repeated so many times therein that I began to question why I was reading anymore. As a reader, I could relate though because even after 523 pages, I walked away with so many unanswered questions: What was Reed’s actual motivation all along, and why did he never actually act on it? What does it mean to “manifest” in the end? What is the “Impossible City”? Why write over 500 pages of repetitive buildup only to have the novel conclude in the short manner it did? Why was Roger’s gift and knowledge of linguistics not as integral (beyond just saying “do this” to Dodger) to the story? What is the point of the random, rather confusing excerpts of “Over the Woodward Wall” (beyond basing a spin-off series on them)? Etc.

In short, I wanted more from this book, especially given the length of it, but was ultimately left unsatisfied.
Customer image
Kristyn
3.0 out of 5 stars The book of "I don't know."
Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2020
Initially, I was drawn to this book because of its interesting premise, but unfortunately the execution just wasn’t satisfying for me. While the third-person omniscient point of view works in some respects here—particularly in getting inside the telepathic-like communication between Roger and Dodger—it ultimately falls flat because no one in the novel really knows anything. In fact, the phrase “I don’t know” is repeated so many times therein that I began to question why I was reading anymore. As a reader, I could relate though because even after 523 pages, I walked away with so many unanswered questions: What was Reed’s actual motivation all along, and why did he never actually act on it? What does it mean to “manifest” in the end? What is the “Impossible City”? Why write over 500 pages of repetitive buildup only to have the novel conclude in the short manner it did? Why was Roger’s gift and knowledge of linguistics not as integral (beyond just saying “do this” to Dodger) to the story? What is the point of the random, rather confusing excerpts of “Over the Woodward Wall” (beyond basing a spin-off series on them)? Etc.

In short, I wanted more from this book, especially given the length of it, but was ultimately left unsatisfied.
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34 people found this helpful
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Amanda
5.0 out of 5 stars Honestly one of the best books that I have ever read. Ever. Seriously.
Reviewed in the United States on February 23, 2020
Verified Purchase
*Also, I highly recommend going into this book without reading the synopsis, it makes the book SO much better if you just go in blind with no expectations at all!*

This was an absolutely breathtaking story. Seanan McGuire knows how to write some of the best stories ever and this is no exception. Everything from the characters to the world to the atmosphere to the writing is absolute perfection. It is honestly a struggle to not turn around, flip back to the the first page and reread the whole story over again. I will for sure be rereading this in the future, it is just that good. Plus, it's the perfect story to reread for years and years and years. I will never tire of the characters in this book, I ADORE Roger and Dodger so much.

If you haven't already, PLEASE GET A COPY OF THIS BOOK! It is just too good to miss out on. This is simply amazing and I would love to see a sequel story written for this at some point but I am quite content with the ending of the book as well. It's a perfect standalone but would make a fantastic series as well. LOVE THIS SO MUCH OMG.
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TDA_Rook
5.0 out of 5 stars One of my favorite reads of last 5 years
Reviewed in the United States on October 16, 2019
Verified Purchase
Ok, so time now for a longer version of why Middlegame is one of my favorite reads of last 5 years.

1. Characters. Everyone has believable motivations and feel fully fleshed out. I found myself putting my hand over mouth when I knew something bad was going to happen to a minor character, because Seanan had made them breath and seem real. No generic "bad guys", every one gets a share of the palette

2. Character interactions: The characters feel achingly real in how they interact with each other. It’s almost like Seanan split into two different writers having real conversations when she wrote the Dodger and Roger interactions. They don’t speak like they should, they speak as they would.

3. Setting: Somehow Seanan squeezed 4-5 books worth of background into a standalone book. The Up and Under portions, the interactions between Reed and Leigh, each chapter lays more bricks into your braincastle until you suddenly realize you are surrounded.

4. Plot and Concept: This book turns on a plot and concept that takes a master class writer to pull off. Dozens of moving parts, the reader knows the broad destination but needs to be spun around and taken for detours, expectations need to be challenged. Seanan deftly pulls this off.

5. Overall quality: Seanan shows her experience and craft in this book, weaving together everything into a tight, lean delight. She is able to be vicious and kind, optimistic and cynical, a dreamer and a realist all in one wonderful great read.

I will be pushing this to my fellow readers.
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Berni
5.0 out of 5 stars Next Year's Hugo Nominee
Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2019
Verified Purchase
I hope, in the years to come, that someone writes papers on McGuire's works. She is very interesting: she has so many different ideas. This book is a departure from her previous series, yet it contains tropes that run throughout most of her books.

One of the most prominent is brother-sister pairings. We see this strongly in her Mira Grant Newflesh novels, the newsie brother and sister. InCryptid has three siblings, yet the oldest brother and sister are the most closely bonded. Middlegame gives us yet another pair, Roger and Dodger.

It's hard to describe this book. What if Dr. Frankenstein's object was to find the way to Narnia/Oz/portal fantasy of your choice? Because that's basically what she's doing here.

Better for you to read it and me to talk about it, because I really can't come up with anything cogent.
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