A new installment in The Magic Kingdom of Landover series (Witches’ Brew, 1995, etc.).
Former lawyer Ben Holiday purchased that magical world and became its king, but experienced many challenges to his power and his kingdom. This latest installment, set several years after the events in Witches’ Brew (1995), focuses on Holiday’s rebellious 15-year-old daughter Mistaya, whose mother is a sylph, one of the numerous magical beings in Landover. After Mistaya is expelled from an Earth-based boarding school, Holiday puts her in charge of renovating Libiris, the abandoned royal library. She refuses and briefly runs away; when finally, reluctantly, she arrives at Libiris, she hears a mysterious voice calling for help from the stacks. Her investigations uncover a plot to dethrone her father involving an evil army of demons. Brooks’s Landover proves to be a fun and engaging fictional universe, and much less daunting for newbies than the wide-ranging Shannara mythos (The Gypsy Morph, 2008, etc.).
A pleasant fantasy romp.
