Kiersten White has once again written a supernatural horror where pieces of information become unlocked as the book goes and everything is revealed in the end. Combine the fast paced writing with nostalgia and horror and you wind up with a great story.

Fans of Hide should rejoice, because this has a similar format, just a different story.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Random House-Ballantine/ Del Ray books for the digital ARC in exchange for an honest review. My opinions are my own.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine as well as the author for this ARC.
#NetGalley #RandomHousePublishingGroupBallantine #MisterMagic #KierstenWhite

Title: Mister Magic
Author: Kiersten White
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine
Publication Date: August 8, 2023
Themes: Family, friendship, loyalty,child abandonment,child and parent estrangement,family dynamics, power of suggestion, television programming, existential horror, creepypasta, religion, cult
Trigger Warnings: Child abandonment,child and parent estrangement,family dynamics, found family dynamics

This book is very similar to a creepypasta that many are very familiar to those of us who are fans. Those who don’t make a habit of reading creepypastas may recognize the story in question from the first season of the Syfy show, Channel Zero. The creepypasta is called Candle Cove and it tells the story of a children’s show that only children can see. Mister Magic isn’t quite the same as Candle Cove but I felt myself thinking of the creepypasta often. Mister Magic is an enigmatic character on a popular children’s tv show. Some say he was a puppet, some say he was a man but no one can verify this because there is no footage anywhere or information about this show. Everyone remembers the tv show that meant so much to them except Val. Val has spent most of her life working as a riding instructor and horse wrangler alongside her father. When her father dies, some people show up at the funeral that claim to know her. They tell her that she was on the well-known television show with them and that she was the main member of their circle. They want her to come with them to a reunion and help to record a podcast about the show. Val has no memory of any of it but feels an inexplicable draw to these people. She decides to leave the ranch with them to seek out the childhood that waits behind the door of her memory.
This book was a long ride and, sometimes, a convoluted journey. I quickly became entangled in Val’s story. The reader is as confused as Val as he/she looks through her eyes. Along with Val, we meet more and more people who have been affected in both positive and not so positive ways. There is a lot of metaphor in this book that is left up to the individual’s imagination. The cult feel is a constant and creepy companion. The author places her own religious experience as an allegory throughout the novel. Each character seems to represent a different part of these past experiences. Jenny represents the traditional woman’s role which is sexism. Marcus is a black and gay man, representing prejudice. Val has forgotten everything but isn’t very proactive. She lets things play out as they will. This is faith, however misplaced. Maybe I’m overthinking but that’s what I took from it. This was a prime example of existential horror. I highly recommend reading the author’s note at the end of the book as wil help clear up any confusion.
While I felt the characters and the themes were compelling, I did feel that this book was too long and a little too mired in allegory. I have no trouble with a book leaving things up to a reader’s imagination, but not at the expense of the basic story. The ending was a little too fanciful and allegorical for my test. The characters’ choices came across as vague rather than profound as was intended.
Overall, this was a good book. There’s plenty here to keep the reader interested. It may be nice to fill out the story with a few more tangible details.

Once again, a book by Kiersten White had a very promising plot but veered into a story based on the author's personal opinions on religion, social issues, and politics. I loved the idea of this story...mystery surrounding an old children's program...but it definitely didn't live up to my expectations.

I understand that the author experienced trauma in her church but I don't think it's fair to pigeonhole every person of faith into her personal experience. I am officially done with this author's books. Disappointing, because she thinks of interesting plots.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley and the publisher to read and review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I received an advanced copy of this book by the publisher. While I love Kiersten White's other books, this one was hard for me to get into. My biggest complaint is that it jumped right into action immediately before I even got to know the main character. The rest was very weird, albeit a bit creepy. I like the premise and the whole arc of what the author was trying to accomplish, but it just felt a little flat for me. I will preface that I was traveling so maybe just missed some things in transit.

I really enjoyed this one! White is a talented writer and her stories always have deep meanings. I really liked the format of the book with the Reddit posts throughout that gave it such a real feeling. I was hooked on trying to figure out the mystery or what was going on and if Mister Magic was real entity or not. I love the supernatural elements that added some creepiness! Sadly it is about religious trauma which is unfortunately something a lot of people deal with. I would def reccomend this book!

A fun twisty book that will have you questioning reality!

This isn't a thriller in the way I was expecting, more of a weird paranormal scifi examination of people's belief systems. I wasn't sure what to expect when I started it but really enjoyed it by the end

This one just wasn't for me. The nostalgic concept I think is great; I just wasn't prepared for how spooky this was. Much more of a horror novel than a thriller. It lost me after a little and just came across as too much horror for me.

"Your favorite childhood television program feels like a fever dream."

Thus begins Mister Magic. Mr. Magic is a children's television show that ran from the invent of television to the early 1990's. Many children remember it from their childhoods, but the details are foggy. Who was Mr. Magic and the circle of 6 friends? Why did the show always appear to be on when the viewer most needed it? Why did it disappear from the airwaves? The public hopes to find answers during a reunion podcast with 5 of the last 6 friends. One friend remembers nothing of her time on the show, the other four have murky memories. Once they come together, they realize that maybe Mister Magic didn't really have their wellbeing in mind.

This book is not a straight forward where are they now. I think we can all relate to the beginning quote. Sometimes when I'm outside in a quiet spot I feel how David the Gnome made me feel as a child. I'm sure I can find David the Gnome on YouTube, but I have no desire to do so. My vague childhood memories will suffice. We get to know Val the most of all the friends, but there is plenty of character development for everyone. I really liked the ending.

Reading this book was like taking a creepy walk through my favorite childhood TV show and discovering nothing is as it seems. Creepy goodness!

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, and Del Rey for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

You remember Mister Magic, don't you? He was tall, or was he short? Didn't he wear a cape? Or was it a top hat? Everyone remembers Mister Magic, or do they?

Five child actors, now grown and living their own adult lives, are thrown back together - despite one of them trying desperately not to be found. Valentine and her father have lived on a remote ranch for the past 30 years in order to stay safe. Val's father never tells her what they need to safe from, though. When her father dies, Val starts to question their life on the ranch - especially when two of her former co-stars show up to the funeral and Val starts to remember them, albeit very vaguely. They tell her someone is making a podcast about the show they used to be on, Mister Magic, and Val decides to leave with them and take a roadtrip to the Utahn desert. Once reunited, the group of friends start remembering more and more about the show and their lives during taping. The more they remember, though, the more they start questioning things - including a tragedy surrounding the sixth member of the Circle of Friends. And the more they discover, the more it seems like they were brought together for a more sinister purpose. Will they be able to uncover the truth before it is too late?

The first half of this book had me hooked, and I was flying through it. Just about halfway through, I started losing steam. My chief issue being that our main character, Val, seems so very complacent with things. Things just *happen* to her, repeatedly, and there's almost no character development until the very end. The end itself felt rushed, and the characters read YA to me when they actually were late-thirties-early-forties. I appreciate that the book is very personal to the author, as explained in her note at the end. I also think it could raise some interesting discussion about religion, cultism, and children's programming. Overall, the book started out strong and fell flat starting around the middle, with the author's note helping to explain things in the end.

I don’t think I have ever said this, but I truly think this would work better on the screen. I had a very hard time visualizing this. It’s a neat concept but the execution left me wanting more.

I received an advanced copy. All thoughts are my own.

Mister Magic is the unnerving story of a podcast reunion for a beloved children's TV show that ended in mysterious and potentially tragic ways. Val was once the leader of "the circle of friends" who sang and played through life lessons under the watch of the mysterious Mister Magic. Thirty years later, Val has no memories of the TV show and its sudden, controversial end. The book weaves online commentary, studio correspondence, and the story of the reunion and provides disturbing musings on the power of media and our twisted takes on childhood and morality.

Thank you @randomhouse and @netgalley for the eARC of this in exchange for my honest review!!!

Mister Magic was a children's show that almost every kid from the early 90's remembers, but there is no evidence of the show existing outside of people's own memories. A new podcast is supposedly reuniting the cast and will hopefully shed light on the abrupt, tragic ending to the show.

This book had so much promise but I feel like the author didn't push it far enough. I wanted the horror to be scarier and really go there, but it felt hesitant. The Mister Magic character could have been so scary but just wasn't. I was expecting the "tragedy" to be dark, scary and visceral but it was none of that. I don't want to spoil anything but if you're going to allow the reader to use their imaginations to create the monster, you have to have a great framework and this just didn't. The metaphorical storyline also just barely grazed the surface for me. I didn't feel emotionally connected to the story or the characters which made it fall flat for me. Great idea overall, but it wasn't executed well in my opinion.

#MisterMagic #speculativefiction #NetGalley #horror #bookrecommendations #reviews

Mister Magic is a book about many things, including the seeming magic of childhood and nostalgia. It’s about collective memory (or mis-memory, think the Mandela Effect), the gift of forgetting, the pain and scars of religious trauma, and the perpetuation and breaking of intergenerational trauma.

30 years ago, a children’s show with a mysterious, magical host abruptly went off the air after an unspeakable accident. There is no surviving footage or scripts and no leads on the production company, director, crew, etc. Just 5 adults, all that remains of the last “circle of friends”. Interspersed with Wikipedia pages and discussion-forum comment sections, the book follows the friends as they journey back to the remote desert area where the show was originally filmed to record a reunion podcast. For Val, who has no memories of her time on the show, the trip comes with startling realizations and the uncovering of long-buried memories as she struggles to understand who to trust as the very fabric of reality starts to disintegrate.

I thought this book explored childhood nostalgia and religious trauma really well and resonated with me on many levels. If you were raised evangelical and no longer identify that way, were permanently scarred by the toxicity of “purity culture,” or otherwise have been negatively affected by religion’s good (arguable) intentions, particularly at a young age (hi, it’s me), I think this book will be very cathartic for you. Make sure to stick around for the author’s note.

After reading Hide last year and enjoying it overall, I was excited to know more of Kiersten White’s work. Sadly this one didn’t work for me.

Mister Magic had a weird beginning with Val literally leaving her father’s funeral reception to jump in a car with people she had a feeling she knew but had no memory of. This is something I’d expect from a teenager, but mildly acceptable for someone sheltered from society. This also links to my main concern with this book, that even though the protagonists are said to be in their late 30s, early 40s, they read as people in their early 20s.

For me, the story was kept undeveloped as the reader was supposed to learn with Val about that was Mister Magic and the show. But as the reveals came, they made little sense and there wasn’t additional explanation. The author’s choice of using her scape of mormonism as the process for Val to learn about her past is an interesting idea, but one that didn’t work for me.

Overall I think this book will be well received by an audience that is more linked/has more knowledge of the Mormon community than I am. As a horror book, it didn’t make me unsettled, fearful or even uncomfortable. Sadly, I was just bored.

Thanks NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine and Del Rey for the advanced reader copy os this book in exchange of my honest opinion.

I enjoyed the first half of this book. There were secrets and so many questions about what really happened on Mister Magic. And the house!! It had a life of its own and it was CREEPY!

But the second half of the book just didn’t work for me. It took a weird turn that I’m not even sure I know how to describe. Overall, I’d give this one 3/5⭐️

Thank you to Netgalley and the author for an advanced copy of this book.

GUYSSS I was SUCKED into Mister Magic by Kiersten White. This is not my typical read but I was hearing all about it, so I had to give it a try!
Mister Magic is about a cultish tv show that tragically ended thirty years ago. No one knows why it ended, and no one even has records of the show. 5 of the last seasons' cast members reunite for a podcast about Mister Magic, with rumors the show will reboot this year. But what happens when one of the cast members doesn’t even have a recollection of being on the show? Will they all find out what really happened that day thirty years ago?
90’s babies who grew up on Barney, Mister Rogers, and Zoom are going to LOVE this and really connect with the book. This show is obviously not real, but it felt real by the author’s use of words and imagery. I really felt like I was watching Mister Magic and had even watched it when I was a kid. It is hard to nail down the genre of this, but it gives off suspense/paranormal/fantasy vibes. By the end, this book had such a bigger, deeper meaning that I keep thinking about long after it was done. This would be great for a book club book to discuss the connections and other points of view!
I could not put this down and thought the ending was great. At times, I had a tough time following along with what was happening in the story, but I think its because of the paranormal aspect. This was easily a 5 out of 5 stars read for me!

If I had to describe this book in three words they would be Creepy, Creepy, and ohh yeah Creepy.

That being said I found myself obsessed with it, I will say I had a bit of a hard time getting into it but that was mostly because I had some thoughts swimming around in my head from things I had read about this book and the Author.

Once I let go of reality and just let the story take me away I found myself fascinated with this world, worried about the characters, and hopeful for a happy ending.

Trauma is a horrible thing, I'm not saying it's not, but trauma doesn't have to define us, we can move past it, we can take things that seemed so wrong at the time and then realize that they were just moments that sent us on the path we were always meant to be on.

Val, Isaac, Marcus, Jenny, Javi, and Kitty lived through something that was both traumatic and tragic, some of them moved on, some of them were changed forever, and some of them... well you'll have to read the book to find out.

I will say my heart broke for Val over and over again, trying to put the pieces of her past back together, trying to figure out why her dad did what he did, and trying to figure out who she can trust, over and over he grasp on reality is tested.

Trying to figure out how to write this review without giving anything away has been so tough, I know the Acknowledgements give some insight into the story, what inspired the Author, and what's real and what's not, but I feel like if you're going into this book you need to have an open mind.

For me, this would be a 4.5-star book but I'll be rounding it up to 5 stars for review purposes.

Thank you to Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley for providing an advance reader copy of this E-Book, I have voluntarily read and reviewed it and all Thoughts and opinions are my own.

This was interesting. The mystery slowly unwrapped. Was confusing trying to determine what it was all about. From a horror perspective I preferred Hide. After reading the author's note I understood better that this was a simile for the Mormon faith which she was part of when she was young.

Full disclosure: I stopped this book at about 30% because it just wasn’t working for me. But, because I hate leaving things undone, I picked it up again a couple weeks later and finished it in a couple of sittings.

I’ll leave you to read the synopsis elsewhere and only hit a few high points.
Val doesn’t remember her childhood. She doesn’t remember her younger sister that died very young. She doesn’t remember her mother. She only knows that her father kept them on the run during most of her young life and that he warned her to never let anyone know who she was. He warned her that people were looking for them and were not to be trusted.
When he dies suddenly, there are people at his funeral that she doesn’t know. But she does…and doesn’t know why. They are friends from the time in her life that she can’t remember and they want her to go with them to a reunion of a TV show she was on when she was a kid. A TV show that can’t be found anywhere. There are no clips, no video tapes, no found still pictures. Nothing. Just word of mouth from so many people that remember it, but can’t prove it ever existed.

This story had me from the second I read the initial synopsis. Kids in danger. A character that called himself Mister Magic and could make any wish come true. A questionable narrator. Danger and intrigue.
And this story has it all. And more.
But, unfortunately, it loses itself somewhere in the last quarter of the book. Like the man who painted himself in a corner, then couldn’t find a safe way to get out.
The character development was good. You could almost visualize them in your head as they interacted with each other. The momentary bits and bites of romance were sweet and added a bit of needed realism to the story. The drama and uncertainty had enough depth to hold attention.
I won’t spoil the ending for anyone, but I will say it left me wanting. Another reader may be completely satisfied with the answers given, but I needed something that wasn’t offered by the author. A sense of closure.
At the end of the day…did I enjoy the book? Mostly.
Would I read it again? Probably not.