| A Princess of Landover | ||||||||
| Terry Brooks | ||||||||
| Del Rey, 328 pages | ||||||||
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A review by Dominic Cilli
A Princess of Landover is mainly told through the eyes of Mistaya Holiday, daughter to the king and queen
of Landover; Ben Holiday and Willow. Mistaya is now 15 years old and has been sent by her parents to the natural world
to attend Carrington Women's' Prepatory Academy in present day America. She doesn't really fit in there and promptly
gets suspended and has to return home to Landover to face her parents' ire. After arguing with her father, Mistaya
decides to run away from home. She ends up at the ancient library of Libiris where she hopes to escape the detection
of her father. Once she arrives, she discovers not everything is as it seems at Libiris and soon uncovers a mystery
and becomes embroiled in a plot that could threaten all of Landover.
If you have read any of the Magic Kingdom of Landover series you will see a
lot of familiar faces and creatures making
their reappearance in A Princess of Landover. The usual lineups of characters are all
present and accounted for. Quester Thews court wizard, Abernathy, court scribe, Strabo, Landover's last
dragon, the G'home Gnomes and of course, Ben Holiday and his wife Willow. As I mentioned earlier, this is the
sixth book in the series so Brooks is able to draw on a rich history which adds some depth to his characters,
given of course that you have read the other books.
Terry Brooks is a seasoned veteran and knows how to keep those pages turning so there is no problem with the
flow and pacing and overall the writing is solid but, A Princess of Landover is extremely light fantasy
and not aimed at an adult audience. Furthermore, one of the problems with not having released a book in a series
aimed at teens for fourteen years is that most fans of this series are probably going to have outgrown this type
of writing by now, so his audience for this book may be limited a bit. On the other hand, A Princess of Landover
could introduce a whole new generation of young readers to the
Magic Kingdom of Landover series. I think teens and
fans of young adult fantasy literature will find A Princess of Landover an enjoyable read. However, older and more
seasoned fantasy readers will find the simplistic plot and juvenile themes to be troublesome and should
probably stay away from A Princess of Landover. People should feel free to tuck this one under the Christmas
tree for teens or fans of young adult fantasy literature and A Princess of Landover is ideal for parents
who still enjoy reading bedtime stories to their children about magical far away places.
When asked to write a third-person tag line for his reviews, Dominic Cilli farmed the work out to an actual 3rd person, his friend Neal, who in turn turned it over to a second person who then asked his third cousin to help out and this person whom Dom doesn't even know then wrote in 8th person Omniscient mode "Dom's breadth of knowledge in literature runs the gamut and is certainly not bounded by the Sci-Fi/Fantasy genre. One thing I can say with certainty is that of all the people I don't know who've ever recommended books to read, Dom's recommendations are the best. |
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