The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic

June 3, 2013
Nora Fischer has lost everything: dumped by her boyfriend, her dissertation going nowhere fast, her life an empty shell. She decides she needs an escape. In this ambitious, densely packed debut by journalist Barker, Nora finds that instead of getting a small break from normality, she has escaped into another world in which magic exists—and is not as cute and cuddly as she might have imagined. Though the story starts with a classic tale of unpleasant fairies working their will, it morphs into something deeper and more nuanced when Nora meets the magician Aruendiel. Barker weaves together classic fantasy and romantic elements (including shout-outs to Pride and Prejudice and hints of Wuthering Heights) to produce a well-rounded, smooth, and subtle tale. Agent: Emma Sweeney, Emma Sweeney Agency.

September 1, 2013
Debut novelist Barker turns in a pleasant if largely predictable fantasy yarn. Nora Fischer is a brilliant literary scholar, "one of the best close readers of poetry I've ever worked with," as her dissertation director tells her before dropping the big old but on her: but she doesn't deal with big questions, with postmodernism or subalternity or dialogic hegemony or...well, Nora gets the picture. Neither is Nora a slouch when, quite by happenstance it would seem, she wanders through a mysterious portal into the otherworld. Though she has magically become more beautiful, she fails to attract the physical yearnings of Oscar Wilde, though she exchanges some good words with him all the same--and, he reminds her, "appearances are the only true reality." Hmmm. No sooner are the words out than she is swept away by a handsome--well, prince, maybe, certainly VIP in this behind-the-mirror world--man (man?) who is very much something other than what he seems to be. Now Nora's got other things to worry about, like how not to turn into stone ("cream colored stone. Marble, maybe"). Helping her along is a gruff and grumpy sorcerer type named Aruendiel--he wouldn't be a sorcerer without a Welsh name, after all--who, though "a man of strong passions," as another denizen of the back of beyond puts it, can't be moved to make it a friends-with-benefits relationship. Will petrification ruin Nora's looks? Will she ever find her true love in the magic kingdom? Will she get back to real life in time to pay her tuition? Barker's pages tell all--and leave plenty of room for a sequel or even a series. Think of this book as Hermione Granger: The Grad School Years. An entertaining tale capably told.

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March 15, 2013
While not supervising international coverage as executive editor of the "American Lawyer", first novelist Barker has been living in another world entirely; her heroine, hapless graduate student Nora Fischer, has passed through a portal to a fantasy world where she enjoys fabulous looks and a fabulous boyfriend. Then the fairy tale turns dark. Juicily promising, like Libba Bray's "Gemma Doyle" series for adults.

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2014

Ever wanted to completely escape your life? Nora is a graduate student whose dissertation is stalled and whose boyfriend is getting married--to someone else. On a weekend getaway, Nora wanders off and accidentally slips through a portal into another world. At first it is fairy tale-like, but soon the darker side becomes apparent. How will this modern woman survive in a strange, magical world and will she be able to find her way home? VERDICT This is an intelligent, well-plotted fantasy set in a rich and complex world--a perfect escapist fantasy for a hot summer day. (LJ 7/13)

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.