Monday, 14 November 2016

The Magisterium Series

The Magisterium series is a five-book series of fantasy novels, one book for each year of Call’s life between twelve and seventeen. It is co-written by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare. So far only the first three books have been released: The Iron Trial, The Copper Gauntlet, and The Bronze Key.

Let me start off by saying that I LOVE Cassandra Clare and Holly Black, so I feel like I was always going to like these books, but it wasn’t until The Bronze Key that I really started to love the series. Much like Harry Potter we start off with a scarred boy who finds out he is magic, and (against his father’s wishes) attends school in order to learn how to control his power. There he becomes best friends with a boy from a poor family (Aaron), and a very smart girl (Hermione, oops I meant Tamara), and life endangering adventures ensue.

The first book was fine enough. I liked the description of the magic school buried underground. Of the weird food, and strange creatures. However while the story was interesting enough, it didn’t warrant much more than a three star rating for me. I read the second book because (once again) I really do love the authors, and I didn’t have much else to read at the time. It was interesting enough, but it still felt very much like a book for junior readers (about nine plus years).

However, like the obsessive series reader that I am, I had to read the third book when it came out at the end of August, and I am so glad I did. All of a sudden the characters seemed to have grown up. They became better developed, their special type of magical powers was explained and explored more, and I just genuinely enjoyed the plot. While book one and two sat at about three stars, The Bronze Key definitely rates four and a half stars for me. Just be careful, because the ending of the book hit me right in the feels, and I still haven’t recovered.

I will be waiting (not so patiently) for the next book to be released in 2017.

Posted by Sas

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