They were, shall we say, different.
My coworker is now reading a series of mystery/fantasy novel titled "Wizard for Hire" Sounds interesting.
Who's the author? I have seem some really good books with that idea. And some really bad ones.
Didn't like Artemis Fowl at all, maybe I'm just too old. Pick up "Guards Guards" by Terry Pratchett (it's a good intro to Discworld) I bet you'll like it. There's only about thirty books in that series so won't take long to catch up ;-)