Among Others was the best book I read this year. It's about a teenager recovering from an accident in the late seventies, sent to a boarding school, and who finds solace in scifi and fantasy books. It's also about magic, but the kind of magic that, as the narrator admits, you could think was just coincidence if you didn't believe in magic.

Walton captures so perfectly the feelings of seeming apart from your schoolmates, of the voracious reading, and finding compatriots in other readers, that I might almost say it doesn't need the magic. Except, of course, that it does, lest it be a different book.

Of course, I'm just six years younger than Mor, the narrator, and so perhaps it's all just something that rings true to those a particular time. But I think not. If you're a reader of any stripe, this is one you'll want to read.

FuzzyCo grade: A+