My Little Pocketbooks: Review: The Golem's Eye (Bartimaeus Sequence #2)

The Golem's Eye (Bartimaeus Sequence #2)
Author: Jonathan Stroud
Genre: Children's Fantasy
Age Range: 12 and up
Series: The Bartimaeus Sequence
Publisher: Listening Library
Release Date: January 13, 2009
Audiobook: 16 hrs and 8 mins
Narrator: Simon Jones
Source: Free from e-library

Book Description

The second adventure in the Bartimaeus trilogy finds our young apprentice magician Nathaniel working his way up the ranks of the government, when crisis hits. A seemingly invulnerable clay golem is making random attacks on London. Nathaniel and the all-powerful, totally irreverent djinni, Bartimaeus, must travel to Prague to discover the source of the golem's power. In the ensuing chaos, readers will chase a dancing skeleton across London's skyline, encounter the horror of the dreaded Night Police, witness a daring kidnapping, and enter the Machiavellian world of the magician's government. Eventually, Nathaniel and Bartimaeus have to go head to head with the fearsome golem before the surprise identity of his master is finally revealed.

Review

Where do I start with this one?
I picked up this audiobook as part of my Spring Sequel Reading Challenge. The first book was ok and I had no idea where the series would head after listening to the ending. The second book was a bit of a disappointment for me. I think I had hopes of a Harry Potter kinda series and this is nothing like it at all. I am not sure if it is fair to compare the two but when you have an British orphaned boy in a world of magic, how can you not compare. The story outline from book one really felt like Harry Potter to me. Anyways, this is not it!
The series continues with Nathaniel now an employed government worker in the magician run British society. Nathaniel has grown up a bit and now finds himself in the middle of a disaster. First, a giant golem (In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, magically created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing- Wikipedia) made of clay with extra ordinary magical powers starts wreaks havoc all over London while a gang of non-magical thieves break into a well stocked magical tomb causing a murderous skeleton to be set free in London. There is just so so much going on in this story. Oh and did I mention there are night police everyone is afraid of going around taking the non magical people for silly crimes. I think this would have been a better read if the author focused mainly with one disaster and a few characters then I wouldn't have been overwhelmed with too much going on. From the first book I thought the Harry Potter-like little boy, Nathaniel was the protagonist but in this book he is more of a secondary co-character to Bartimaeus (a genie) and Kitty. Kitty is one of the non-magical gang members. I am not loving this chaos of a story at all. There are zero characters to fall in love with. Maybe Kitty by there is nothing really interesting about her. *sigh*
The most redeeming thing about this audiobook is the narrator Simone Jones who is out of this world amazing. He has a great reading voice and he is excellent at not making it sound like he is not reading the book but living it. Bravo! You get two stars!