Stunning book about ending the cycle and unpacking your childhood

Love the characters and the creepy parts when it hits a little too close to home

I was unsure about this one at first due to a slow start and not much happening for a while but glad I stuck with it. Very unique plot and great ending. I really ended up caring about the characters and will think about this book for a while now. Thanks to Netgalley for the free ARC!

Probably a bit mature than the classes I'm teaching now, but I am completely enamored of this book. There was a dip towards the end when it started to feel a bit stagnant, but for the most part it was creepy and thought provoking in an amazing way!

Thank you Net Galley for allowing me to receive this book for an honest review.

I was so looking foward to reading this book because it had good reviews. But I found myself picking it up and putting it down several times. I just couldn't get into it and could not relate to the characters.
I found that I was not interested in it enough to finish this book.

When I saw this title come across I couldn't wait to read it. I had read the author's previous book Hide and loved it! This one had me a little confused throughout the book. The main character lives on a ranch with her father and has no real memories of her past. All her father tells her is that they have to basically lay low for their protection. All is well until her father dies and a couple friends from her past find her.. She doesn't really remember them but something about them is familiar and comforting.

Apparently they were part of a group of six children that were part of a children's show when they were younger but a tragic accident happened and none of them seem to really remember what happened. I was really confused most of the time. I pushed through and finished. Hoping it was just me that was confused.

A creepy genre-bending exploration of trauma and the loss of childhood innocence. I felt like I never knew where this book was going, andI look forward to reading more of White’s book’s in the future.

This was a weird ass book. One thing about weird ass books, though: I love them! 🤣

You grew up watching Mister Magic on the little black box in your living room. Couldn’t sleep? Even at two o’clock in the morning, Mister Magic was on. He sang you silly little rhymes that taught you how to be a good little boy or girl. And then, suddenly… Mister Magic and his circle of six friends were gone. They vanished without a trace. You were all alone.

What happened to Mister Magic? I hated the creepy house in this book!!!! It had six identical floors with no doors and a terrifying basement. 🫠 What a nightmare. The whole story was pretty bonkers! My 3.5 ⭐️ rating is attributable to a whole lot of things going on at one time and also the seemingly rushed ending. I would definitely read White’s next release, however. 🤗

First of all I would like to say thank you to the publisher for allowing me to read this book early.

Mister Magic is the story of a 30 something heart old woman named Val and a group of her friends. It is also the story of a lost childhood and learning about the past. It starts off with Val on a ranch and her father passing away. From there you learn that she was on a show called Mister Magic, but had no memory of it at all.

I don't want to spill anything so I'll just leave it there. I enjoyed my time with this story and wanted to know what was going to happen, but I was also able to put it down. All in all I have it 3.5 stars.

One children’s show cut short too soon - and a reunion of the last cast that will change everything. We follow the last cast of the Mister Magic show as they try to tackle what happened in the last episode. Interspersed with what people from the larger society remembers of the show, and what our main character begins to remember our idea of a wholesome children’s show starts to take a drastic turn. 3.5/5

Unfortunately, this book didn't work so well for me. This is a mystery, yes, but usually in mystery you get little parts of the missing pieces as the story goes on. With this, it doesn't give much away until it finally gives everything, and that doesn't happen until the last part of the book at maybe around 80%. So many things just didn't add up for me or make sense.

The characters are also nearly 40 years of age and they do not read like adults at all despite most of them having children. They read like teenagers themself. Honestly, the only reason this isn't getting a 1 star from me is because of how much I was intrigued about this book, at least for the first part. But around 70% I kind of lost hope of anything getting better.

This is a very personal and important work for the author and I'm happy for her that this was such a needed story to be told in her heart. I would say maybe if I read the author's note first I wouldn't have been as confused as I was and would have had something to help guide my understanding.

This book gave Mandela effect vibes but also cultish and more than enough gaslighting to go around. Kiersten put a parents fear of what their children watch on TV into a spooky book. I don’t know if I would call this a horror book even though it is marketed as one. Nor would I classify this as a thriller really. I am basically confused about what I just read lol.

The characters were all pretty average but did grow on me throughout. Each ended up showing signs of personal growth as well which is something I always look for - I don’t like stagnant characters. I do think I caught the twist pretty early on which may be why I don’t consider this a thriller. I think the setting of a desert is perfect for this. With no one around but a town full of people hiding things. Overall, this was an odd book but I will 100% be overly cautious about what my future children watch on TV!

Thank you to netgalley for providing an e-galley for review. Mister Magic is one of those books about one of those shows that everyone remembers, but no one has proof it ever existed. It has creepy kids, doing creepy kid things and a host that no one ever sees. This was spooky and strange and more psychological than gory. Very fun

I wanted to love this so much more than I did. While
3.5
I didn’t hate Hide, it wasn’t a favorite of mine, so I was definitely nervous to read this one.
I loved the idea of this one. A spooky kids show that has an eerie past/no one knows much about, now coming back together for a podcast.
My biggest issue is, it’s sooooo confusing. The authors note at the end talking about what this book is actually about is great, but none of that really translates in the book. I wish the author had maybe been a bit more obvious with the undertones to make it a bit more interesting and simpler to follow. I think the ideas are too subtle for most to actually get. So all you get is a confusing story with no concrete concepts.

Overall I really enjoyed this latest horror title from Kiersten White, and I look forward to hopefully more stories in this vein.

I thought the characters were great. They all had distinct personalities so you don't get any of them confused, and you find yourself feeling warmly towards them all, even when you're warned their motives may not be altruistic.

I've seen the concept of an "evil children's television program" before and I like the idea. This was a pretty unique take but I didn't get much of a sense of horror from it. I was more concerned about the main character being kidnapped than in her having to face off against an evil entity or the ghosts of children who were once on the show. This book felt more like a slow-burn thriller than a horror book to me. I think I was hoping for more of a supernatural element, and that felt like it was missing. But it was so original and unpredictable in the way it all played out, that I enjoyed it immensely! The ending was not satisfying for me, personally, but it wasn't devastatingly disappointing, either. I'd give this one 4 stars and recommend it to others who enjoy a creepy story that holds your attention.

I really like Kiersten White's Hide, so I'm very excited to read her latest book, Mister Magic.

White is so good at creating the mysterious vibe, and even halfway through the book, I told my friend I couldn't figure out if this is supposed to be a thriller or a paranormal story.

The story is about Mister Magic, a long-running kids' show that has been terminated for 30 years, but there was effort to reunite old cast members for a podcast. The weird thing is, there's very little record of this show online, and no recordings of the show anywhere.

I don't want to say too much about the story to spoil anything, but the metaphor of this story is not something I've seen coming, and I thought it was a genius way to show that childhood trauma from certain adult influence. In some weird way, I feel like this was a dark twisted version of Peter Pan and Neverland. Definitely read author's note at the end of the book if you're confused what the metaphor is about, but it shouldn't be hard to pick up from the clues.

In the 1990s, a children's show called Mister Magic had achieved cult status: a group of friends, playing together and learning life lessons from a mysterious caped figure; the show appeared in that space between channels, seemingly on whenever a child looked for it. But the show came to an abrupt end, and has only been spoke about in online spaces since. Val doesn't remember her time on the show, only that she and her father arrived at the ranch when she was about 8 and never spoke about her mother or anything before that time. After Val's father dies, the other friends from Mister Magic appear, asking her to join them on a revival podcast. Val goes, and uncovers the truths about her life and the frightening story behind the story of Mister Magic. Kiersten White excels in taut storytelling and harrowing reveals.

This book was so intriguing. It was a statement on society and the destructiveness of fanatical belief. It is a personal story for the author, and if you read the afterword you gain more of an appreciation for the book. I don't want to say to much, but my favorite thing about this story is the message to love your children enough to support them in the person they will become, and not try to mold them into the person you want them to be.

The premise of Mister Magic intrigued me. And also, that cover is so eye-catching! Five former child stars are reuniting 30 years after the show they were on, Mister Magic, ended due to a tragedy. Fans of the show have vivid memories of the show, but there is no surviving video of the show, no evidence of who directed or produced it, and no records of who—or what—the beloved host actually was, no evidence it even existed at all (I totally started thinking about that Genie movie with Sinbad that I still swear exists).

I was immediately drawn into the book. The story was creepy and mysterious with complex characters and a cult-like atmosphere. I especially loved the inserts in between chapters with excepts from online discussion forums, articles, and Wiki pages. I loved the eerie house too, it was truly creep-tastic!

The last third of the book seemed a bit rushed and left me feeling a little confused and slightly disappointed at the ending. However, after reading the author's note after the book's end I came to appreciate it more. This was different from the only other book I have read by Kiersten White, And I Darken, which I loved, but I did enjoy it.

I absolutely loved the set up for this story. A famous kids show beloved by an entire generation put it's stamp on entertainment...... except there's no proof of it. No videos, no behind the scenes photos, no IMDB listing. Years after it's original airing, it exists only in the memories of its viewers and the scrolls of Reddit posts. Reading this, I kept imagining how I would feel if "Are You Afraid of the Dark" couldn't be found anywhere and I absolutely loved it. I blew through the first half of this book before it started dragging. While the end did come back and wrap it all up nicely, I definitely struggled with the middle of this book despite absolutely loving the premise. I wish I could put my finger on exactly what it was, but it just didn't keep me reading the way it did at the start. Overall though, really enjoyed this one. It was very unique and definitely stood out from other new novels. Can't wait to see what else this author comes out with!

I was soo excited for this book, but I feel like it was a missed opportunity. A book about a defunct kids tv show where they cast reunites later sounds amazingly fun, but in reality “Mister Magic” didn’t really live up to that bill. It was bizarre and had some supernatural elements that seemed over the top. I think I would have enjoyed it more if it was a bit more realistic as to the underlying mystery and drama. Accordingly, this one didn’t really work for me, so I’m ratting it 2 stars ⭐️ . Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley.