Customer Reviews

Air Apparent (Xanth #31)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Air Apparent (2007) is the thirty-first fantasy novel in the Xanth series, following Stork Naked. In the previous volume, the Sorceress Morgan le Fey was frustrated at every turn. Finally, she disguised herself as Surprise Golem, but Che the Winged Centaur was ready for her. Surprise recovered her baby and returned home.

In this novel, Wira is worried about her husband Hugo. He had gone down to the wine cellar to get a bottle of Rhed Whine about thirty minutes ago. He should have returned after ten minutes. So she goes looking -- in a manner of speaking -- for him.

Wira is blind, so the lightless cellar is no burden for her. She snaps her fingers and locates a body lying on the floor. When she touches it, the body is cold and clammy. But it is not her husband.

She screams and the Gorgon -- Hugo's mother -- was the first to respond. She checks the body and believes it to be not dead, but in suspended animation. The Gorgon goes to wake her husband Humfrey, the Good Magician.

Humfrey finds that the Book of Answers is scrambled. Obviously it cannot be used to solve the mystery, so Humfrey decides to send the next querent out with Wira to recover Hugo. He suggests that they tell people that Wira is looking for a way to regain her sight.

In this story, Debra is the next querent. She is a young Mundane teenager who wants to find out how to remove a curse that she has acquired since arriving in Xanth. She agrees to accompany Wira and the Gorgon gives her a magic potion to transform her into a winged centaur.

Debra is rather embarrassed by her disguise, since Centaurs do not wear clothes. Also, she finds that flying requires some practice. Yet they are soon on their way.

First they fly to the Region of Air to question Cumulo Fracto Nimbus, but he has been missing for the same length of time as Hugo. Happy Bottom -- Fracto's wife -- and their daughter Fray start searching for the missing males in nooks and crannies while Wira and Debra search on the surface. Along the way they collect other searchers.

Meanwhile, Hugo is trapped in an underground room. He supplements the water and black bread with his talent of producing fruits. Then he meets Bathos Bat and exchanges bodies. Hugo flies out to determine the location of his prison and Bathos gorges himself on overripe fruit.

This story starts out as a quest to find Hugo and then Fracto, but soon turns into something else. Hugo is found and is returning to the Good Magician's Castle on Becka the Dragongirl, but disappears in mid-air. Then he changes bodies with the Random Factor, who is able to randomly switch bodies or locations for a few times each day.

This tale is a Xanth novel, so naturally it is jampacked with puns and wordplays. And it has an intriguing layer of mysteries and many twists and turns. Enjoy!

Highly recommended for Anthony fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of magical talents, puns galore, and a bit of romance.

-Arthur W. Jordin

I fell in love with Pierce and with all fantasy novels as I read my first fist Xanth novel in Junior High. I learned what a pun was from the master and I loved every one!

AIR APPARENT is simply Xanth filled with horrendous puns that readers either make readers groan or laugh at the wild cast.

I anxiously await each new installment of Xanth. The puns are so bad that I cannot help but be highly amused. This book measures up to the rest and I can't wait for the next. Keep it up Piers!

I ended reading about Xanth with Two to the Fifth due to the utter descent of content in the books. Air Apparent was not the start, it occurred before then, but I had slowed down by Xone of Contention and had trouble continuing to read the stories. It is a shame for the early ones I still find worth rereading now and then but I would never try doing so with the later ones. To prove my feeling I chose "Air Apparent". I was right, I lost interest early and could not recover it. I always hated Piers Anthony Jacob for not continuing with some of his heroes, The beginning, Trent, ws one example, and the succeeding Kings of Xanth were also interesting except Anthony never kept them around for long, he had stories to tell and he needed new characters for these stories and he produced them In the early going this was great, I kept waiting for his fallen characters to be reintroduced in later adventures and sometimes he did, to my satisfaction. But the last two must have fallen prey to his age, seventy is not very old but Piers did not age grqcefully in his writings, the Adult Conspiracy grew too great and sex had trouble hiding, almost violating the conspiracy and what it had come to conceal, Mundane characters with their knowledge knew too much too soon and did not lose their knowledge with their advance into Xanth, they only paid lip courtesy to its existence. This helped ruin the books where two sets of children existed, those who lacked knowledge under the tenets of the conspiracy and those who only pretended to be ignorant of its boundaries.
And Piers Anthony had trouble himself keeping the knowldge hidden, it was practically spelled out in the books, especially when it came to fauns and nymphs, and women's panties. He needed to introduce aging potions and capital D demons to age characters else he would be forced to show Xanthians practicing pedophilia, or maybe they did, I think it was nebulous enough for the reader to form his own perception of what went on. In "Air Apparent" different species had different viewpoints, and they matured at differnt ages, making the human (Solar) age ludicrous as a standard. Also the orbiting planets around a human head! It was impossible to make sense of this, and upworld and downworld directions! What nonsense. One passes through zero and what direction is possible? Is zero oblivion? This is a magic realm, what are the rules? well, maybe the reader can have fun trying to find out. I do not think it is worth the bother.

Tags: piers anthony, xanth, magic, demons, puns, mundane

I've been reading the Xanth books for years and with the exception of Faun and Games I'd always had fun reading them. But this book was utter drivel. I used to enjoy his books greatly because while they were always silly Piers did develop characters and relationships and you were enjoying learning about the magical world of Xanth and its people. In this book though, the characters are barely even two dimensional, and there's no building up of relationships. Instead X and Y meet and they're in love and it's magical and that's the end of it. And A and B are around each other for more than 5 minutes and they're in love, oh and C and D are too just for good measure.

But more than that the plot becomes so complex as Piers goes into ludicrous explanations of how various events could happen. The plot is so contrived, so unbelievable and so non-sensical that I almost could not finish this book. I realize expecting a Xanth book to make sense may be a contradiction in terms, but generally the plots are clever and at least understandable.

With the introduction of Ida's worlds I think the Xanth books have taken a decided downturn where Piers feeling I suppose bored with the wonderful standard Xanth he had created is now compelled in all of his latest books to return yet again to the worlds of Ida's moons to create an increasingly complex and utterly unbelievable, non-contiguous concept of stories, where each book requires extensive explanation as to how the plot might be plausible and doesn't actually (or does it?) contradict what we've learned in previous books.

I will never pay for another Xanth book at this point, but perhaps I'll give another one a try if I find it in the library given how long I've stuck with the series. Don't waste your money too.

Another chapter in the always funny Xanth series, Piers Anthony just keeps turning them out each year and his readers are glad he does.I know my wife and I look forward to October each year.

This is a fun series and never fails to entertain, but this edition pushes the envelope of the "Adult Conspiracy". This volume is NOT for children! As the series gets longer, the subject mater gets a little more serious and less appropriate for pre-teens and teens. Part of Xanth's appeal is the cover illustrations, so an actual book is best at least until they find a way to publish the artwork with the Kindle edition.

After the first book I read by this author, I went and purchased the complete Xanth series of books, well over 30. I have about five left to read. I am enthralled and entrapped in Xanth and Mr Jacob's (Piers Anthony) mind. My vocabulary has expanded extensively because of the talent of this author to explore subjects of immense complexity and still keep it lighthearted and fun to read. I look forward to exploring his other series. Thank you Mr. Anthony.

Piers Anthony does it again. Any die-hard Xanth fan will thoughly enjoy this book too. A note to readers, I have noticed that in his later Xanth novels, the adult conspiracy has been weakening and occasionally teens will experience a reprieve - not completely but more than some people may be comfortable with. Overall, 5 stars! Read it for the fun, punny story it's mean to be.

The son of the Gorgon and Good Magician Humphrey, Hugo disappears without a trace from the cellar of his home. His blind wife of seventeen Wira, panics as her spouse is always prompt and not subject to vanishing. At the same time that Hugo went poof into thin air or somewhere else, the corpse of a murder victim arrives in the cellar.

Meanwhile something happens to Humphrey's book of answers so that he cannot provide any help; besides the cost is very high when you are already paying him like everyone else in Xanth seems to be doing. Instead, a bewildered Wira gets a break when thirteen year old Debra arrives from Mundania. However, Debra, "De-bra" to males has crossed over in hope that Humphrey can provide her the cure to her curse of the accent of her name by men; Humphrey cannot help her since his book of answers remains out of commission. The Gorgon converts Debra into a naturally bra-less flying centaur in exchange for her helping find Hugo and uncover the identity of the killer. Debra accompanied by Wira pun their way across Xanth on their quest.

AIR APPARENT is simply Xanth filled with horrendous puns that readers either make readers groan or laugh at the wild cast. The story line is a typical Xanth quest that roams anywhere and everywhere a pun or bad word joke can be found. Piers Anthony thanks his fans for providing some of the worst jokes that even Milton Berle would not have borrowed. Yet even at 31, the escapades in Xanth remain fun and humorous with the loyal audience casting a spell for Mr. Anthony to continue rewriting Humphrey's book of answers.

Harriet Klausner