what I thought about "advent"

I'm kind of mad at this book, but not as mad as I could be.  I picked it up at the library, off the staff recommendations shelf, and at first when I saw that it was about a boy with strange powers whose parents didn't understand him, I was like, "Flippin heck.  Here we go through another inferior Harry Potter retread (see: The Magicians)."  But it got very different very fast, and it was so creative and so well written that I was just in love with it.  The characters were new and interesting, and the sense of place is very strong.  But then toward the end there is some heavy use of deus ex machina, and he lost me.  A whale for some reason?  Masks and open doors?  Eskimos out of nowhere?  It's like Treadwell was writing two different stories and forgot to connect them until the end, and then he was all slapdash about it, when his craftsmanship was so impressive for the rest of the book.  I felt gypped. 

I was a lot more angry until I saw that it's the first book of a trilogy.  So my criticism is conditional.  Maybe it will all make sense in a minute.  The conclusion is still a little jarring, but I will see what happens.  I'm very eager to read the next two books.  If you like fantasy or mythology you should read this book.  There is some use of the F word, if you'd rather not read that.