Comfortably predictable fare for younger fans and those who prefer their fantasy charged with standard themes and tropes.
A blacksmith’s son becomes a wizard’s apprentice in this uncomplicated series opener.
Illiterate Mikal is snatched from his home village and pressed into service oiling bookbindings for the urban magicians of the Guild of Constant Working. Shortly thereafter, he is promoted to librarian/copyist for Harlano, the Guild’s cruel and remote head. The obligatory quest begins with a revelation that all the world’s magic is metal “brightworking,” derived from a lost meteoric “Brightstone.” Supposedly lost, that is—before sending Mikal and company into subsequent episodes (at least two more are planned), Thompson clumsily provides a huge and obvious clue to its whereabouts that his characters miss but readers won’t. Mikal acquires rudimentary reading skills along the way, as well as a quick-witted if mouthy sidekick named Lyra and Orichalkon, a babbling but extremely well-informed clockwork talking head. With their help, he escapes Harlano’s repeated efforts to do him in on the way to a massive fire and an invasion of the city that put him and his companions on the road.
Comfortably predictable fare for younger fans and those who prefer their fantasy charged with standard themes and tropes. (Fantasy. 9-11)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7660-3950-6
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Enslow
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
In this sketchy, incoherent, near-future tale, a child named Rain and the lion she has raised are stolen from an inland village for some never-explained Sacrifice by “Tekkies” inhabiting The Island, a former mountaintop surrounded by risen seas. Aside from vague references to “the Wild,” “Drylands” and air-conditioned “chill chambers,” the author does little to set up either the scene or the back story, nor does she ever reveal why Rain or the lion are considered so significant. Instead she focuses almost entirely on Rain’s unhappiness and confusion through disconnected encounters with Island residents, and then she engineers a highly contrived escape for the girl and lion as their former prison is totally destroyed for unknown reasons. The deadly effects of global warming certainly make a cogent theme, but this effort to take it up seems to have been, at best, phoned in by a veteran South African author who usually offers much more careful and sensitive work (Song of Be, 1993, etc.). Goodness knows, there's a raft of other eco-disaster tales out there for readers so inclined. (Science fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-84780-114-2
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This sequel to A Templar's Apprentice (2010) takes Tormod in circular journeys around Scotland without particularly advancing the plot. The truth o’ yon Tormod’s powers canno’ be denied—or understood very well, given the brogue-laden prose, which lacks the accuracy for true flavor but is still thick enough to interfere with readability. Tormod is on the run with his new friend, the redheaded and equally magically gifted Aine. They skip from adventure to adventure, uncontrolled psychic abilities troubling them while they seek a Knight Templar with the gift of healing. Tormod's health suffers as his visions become worse. His travels, from discovering a village whose residents have been massacred by soldiers to a brief interaction with Robert the Bruce, are soon only interruptions; primarily his days are occupied by delirium, visions and out-of-control magical temper tantrums. At least his fever dreams are revealing the King of France's wicked plot against the Templars, but it won't do him much good as he wanders through the Highlands. A discombobulated traveling tale, best summed up in Tormod's own stream of consciousness: "Torquil. The Abbot. The Templar. Aine. Bertrand. The bairn. Cornelius. Visions. Dreams. Nightmares." (Fantasy. 9-11)
Pub Date: April 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-545-05675-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
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