Rating: 
Summary: Can not wait for the sequal
Review: In South Dakota, a group of scientists, mostly physicists, work on an energy field dubbed the "Source'. The Department of Defense and the CIA fund the research. However, the group sends false reports claiming work on a mining project, but the President of the United States McKay has heard whispers of a different agenda and sends an agent to uncover the truth.
Agent Teri Belner observes something that frightens her so much she knows she must warn the President that these scientists in South Dakota need to be stopped at any cost. However, before she can accomplish her mission, the scientists unleash the Source, which shuts down all electrical power in the world. Some humans are converted into monsters with New York lawyer Cal Griffin desperately trying to find help for his sister caught in the transformation process.
This novel is reminiscent of King's The Stand, but clearly leaves threads for a sequel or two. The tale is loaded with high levels of suspense and action but readers will have to buy the next book for the many unanswered questions. The heroes and heroines of MAGIC TIME seem real and many receive empathy for their plight. Marc Scott Zicree and Barbara Hambly will keep readers enthralled from start to finish with this paranormal work of delicious urban fantasy. Harriet Klausner
Rating: 
Summary: The Day the Lights Went Out
Review: Magic Time is the first novel in a new trilogy in which the nature of reality changes, precluding complex technology such as airplanes and guns, but supporting magical seeming forces. The story has some of the feel of Hambly's Traveling With the Dead, but the basic premise is more like that of Saberhagen's Empire of the East series or Anvil's novel The Day the Machines Stopped, where physical laws are changed by a technological device. In the novel, mutilated buffalo are found near Medicine Water Creek, South Dakota, and a nearby government project discovers another leak from the Source. Fred Wishart is awakened for the emergency meeting, but then returns to bed to dream of his brother Bob. Yet another leak occurs while he is asleep, only this one doesn't stop. In Boone's Gap, West Virginia, Bob Wishart is enjoying a visit from his brother Fred when the electricity fails. The same electrical failure hits the Applby mine, taking out even the miners' helmet lights. In New York City, Cal Griffin is an associate in the law firm of Stern, Ledding, and Bowen. On the morning that reality changes, he discovers that he still owns a conscience and is not looking forward to the morning staff meeting, especially with his daughter Tina accompanying him, but is saved by something like an earthquake with an electrical blackout. Goldy, a mole in the NY tunnel community, is having a really bad premonition about the day and tells Cal keep his head down. Colleen Brooks wakes up to another morning with Rory before she goes to her maintenance job in the Stern, Ledding, and Bowen Building and Rory stretches out for a hard day of TV watching. After the change, Cal and Tina join Colleen in escorting people out of the building. Outside Kansas City, Secret Service Agent Jerri Bilmer is returning to Washington after an undercover investigation of the Source project, but, as her plane begins the final approach, a light flashes in the sky and planes begin to fall out the air. In Washington, the President of the USA is waiting for the return of Agent Bilmer. When the lights go out in DC and stay that way, he sends two other agents searching for her. Not only are the lights out, but people are changing. A touch of humor in Chapter Seven has a secretary telling Cal that Stern is "breathing fire" and later Stern starts turning into a dragon. Tina becomes a Flare, or Angel, a flying being surrounded by a luminous aura, like a large Tinkerbell without wings. Cal, Tina and Colleen join with Goldie and Doc, a Russian physician who sells hot dogs on the street, in a quest to discover the cause of the change. Unknown to them, their first goal is Boone's Gap. I've got to agree with other reviewers regarding the choppy flow of the story. Probably Zicree visualized it as a series of short scenes within a full-length movie; however, a book doesn't provide the rich background of a film that helps orient the viewer to the locale. Nevertheless, it does convey a sense of simultaneity that heightens the effect. Recommended to Hambly and Saberhagen fans and anyone who enjoys urban fantasy and supernatural quests.
Rating:
Summary: The Day the Lights Went Out
Review: Magic Time is the first novel in a new trilogy in which the nature of reality changes, precluding complex technology such as airplanes and guns, but supporting magical seeming forces. The story has some of the feel of Hambly's Traveling With the Dead, but the basic premise is more like that of Saberhagen's Empire of the East series or Anvil's novel The Day the Machines Stopped, where physical laws are changed by a technological device. In the novel, mutilated buffalo are found near Medicine Water Creek, South Dakota, and a nearby government project discovers another leak from the Source. Fred Wishart is awakened for the emergency meeting, but then returns to bed to dream of his brother Bob. Yet another leak occurs while he is asleep, only this one doesn't stop. In Boone's Gap, West Virginia, Bob Wishart is enjoying a visit from his brother Fred when the electricity fails. The same electrical failure hits the Applby mine, taking out even the miners' helmet lights. In New York City, Cal Griffin is an associate in the law firm of Stern, Ledding, and Bowen. On the morning that reality changes, he discovers that he still owns a conscience and is not looking forward to the morning staff meeting, especially with his daughter Tina accompanying him, but is saved by something like an earthquake with an electrical blackout. Goldy, a mole in the NY tunnel community, is having a really bad premonition about the day and tells Cal keep his head down. Colleen Brooks wakes up to another morning with Rory before she goes to her maintenance job in the Stern, Ledding, and Bowen Building and Rory stretches out for a hard day of TV watching. After the change, Cal and Tina join Colleen in escorting people out of the building. Outside Kansas City, Secret Service Agent Jerri Bilmer is returning to Washington after an undercover investigation of the Source project, but, as her plane begins the final approach, a light flashes in the sky and planes begin to fall out the air. In Washington, the President of the USA is waiting for the return of Agent Bilmer. When the lights go out in DC and stay that way, he sends two other agents searching for her. Not only are the lights out, but people are changing. A touch of humor in Chapter Seven has a secretary telling Cal that Stern is "breathing fire" and later Stern starts turning into a dragon. Tina becomes a Flare, or Angel, a flying being surrounded by a luminous aura, like a large Tinkerbell without wings. Cal, Tina and Colleen join with Goldie and Doc, a Russian physician who sells hot dogs on the street, in a quest to discover the cause of the change. Unknown to them, their first goal is Boone's Gap. I've got to agree with other reviewers regarding the choppy flow of the story. Probably Zicree visualized it as a series of short scenes within a full-length movie; however, a book doesn't provide the rich background of a film that helps orient the viewer to the locale. Nevertheless, it does convey a sense of simultaneity that heightens the effect. Recommended to Hambly and Saberhagen fans and anyone who enjoys urban fantasy and supernatural quests.
Rating:
Summary: A message to the authors
Review: Salutations Marc, I just wanted to let you and Barbara Hambly know how much I enjoyed Magic Time and that I am looking forward to the next book. I have read Cinescape since its premiere edition and saw the article about the upcoming novel. I couldn't wait for the book to arrive, and when that familiar brown truck rolled up out front, I met the delivery driver at the sidewalk. I ripped the box open and dove into the Acknowledgements and Prologue. >From there, I went straight into the body of the novel. It took every ounce of strength and self-control to put down the book and participate in my daily routine.
I became so engaged by the characters and plot twists and turns that I felt I was sharing in their experiences. The characters elicited strong emotional responses and I found myself rooting for our band of crusaders and booing the monster attorney. (There's a stretch). In fact, with the assistance of Iain McCaig, Ely Stern has your face, providing of course that you are,or were, a Gargoyle at some point.
I have told everyone that I discuss books with about this one and will continue to recommend it to everyone I know.
Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts and feelings about Magic Time.
Sincerely yours,
Kenneth H. Bell
Rating:
Summary: Amazing!
Review: This book is absolutely amazing! I was, and still am, on the edge of my seat waiting to see what will happen next. The characters are wonderful, and the story is exciting. I'm very excited for the next installment to be released. I hope this book becomes a movie, and I hope that the movie does justice to the beauty and artistry of the book! I encourage everyone who is a fan of fantasy/sci fi to pick up this book! I'm deffinately a fan!!
Rating: 
Summary: Magic Time
Review: This book is initially exciting, perhaps buoyed by Hambly's writing skill. But it quickly becomes a sort of cut-rate, bad comic book cross between Stephen King's The Stand and Sean Stewart's Galveston. Something happens -- we don't get the intellectual satisfaction of learning exactly what -- in a top secret government research facility. Technology stops working, and some people metamorphose. Two foci of presumably destructive power appear -- a rather confusing plot point -- and our questing band of heroes must tackle the first one. There are too many characters for the modest length of the book, and most are not well drawn. The cliched imagery verges on the ridiculous. It really is a comic book -- one person appears to be changing into Catwoman. The plot is fast-moving but shallow and unbelievable. While the basic idea is an interesting one, the book never gets off the ground. It comes across as imitative, lacking themes of its own.
Rating: 
Summary: Waste of time
Review: Warning - read only if you have a few days you want to waste reading disjointed snatches of a re-telling of The Stand. Understand my anger when I tell you I WAS NOT AWARE THIS WAS THE FIRST BOOK OF A TRIOLOGY when I purchased it. By the end - I cared about none of the people and had absolutely no idea what the source/project was and what exactly was done by whom. Furthermore, I don't care enough to read the other books. I love science fiction - love supernatural - this was just plain boring.
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