A Wizard Abroad | |||||
Diane Duane | |||||
Harcourt Brace, 352 pages | |||||
A review by Todd Richmond
A Wizard Abroad begins with Nita journeying to
Ireland. Nita's parents are concerned that Nita, just fifteen,
is spending too much time with her partner Kit. They decide to
send her to visit her Aunt Annie for a long visit, after making
her promise that she won't travel home via magic to visit Kit. They
forget to extract the same promise from Kit, however, who is then
free to travel to Ireland to visit Nita. Nita's parents are also
worried that Nita's childhood is being taken from her by her
responsibilities as a wizard, and they mistakenly think that she
will escape from her duties during her visit.
But as you might expect, Nita is caught up in new adventures in
Ireland. A group of very old Builder-Powers, beings charged with
the building and leveling mountains, and the making and filling
lakes and rivers, were responsible for the creation of Ireland. The
Tuatha de Danaan, as they were called by the humans who came to
dwell there, became attached to their creations and were reluctant
to leave. But they relinquished the lands to the Irish and moved
"sideways" into an adjacent universe, returning on the four great
feast days of the year. Their comings and goings, however, have
widened what was once a footpath between the universes into a
superhighway, and without meaning to, people are beginning to
move "sideways" into the adjacent universe(s). To complicate
matters, the Lone One (the Other, Darkness, Evil) and his minions
are at work as well. With the help of Kit, Dairine, and the
wizards of Ireland, Nita must gather four great treasures from
Ireland's past, awaken them, and use them to close the widening
rift and defeat the servants of Evil.
Besides dealing with this complicated story, the book also deals
with the relationship between Nita and her overprotective parents,
her feelings for Kit and for boys in general, and the other
insecurities that you would expect any normal fifteen year old
girl to be facing. A Wizard Abroad is meant for younger
readers, though, as the description of the plot above may suggest,
it may be a bit complicated for preteens. The series may be of
particular interest to female readers as Nita and her younger
sister are the focus of most of the books and they are strong
female characters. If you've read the other
Wizardry books, this fourth book in the
series won't disappoint you.
Those that enjoy Diane Duane's Wizardry series
may also be interested in Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising
series, which has as its main character a young boy who discovers
on his birthday that he is one of the servants of the Light
and has gained magical powers.
Todd is a plant molecular developmental biologist who has finally finished 23 years of formal education. He recently fled Madison, WI for the warmer but damper San Francisco Bay Area and likes bad movies, good science fiction, and role-playing games. He began reading science fiction at the age of eight, starting with Heinlein, Silverberg, and Tom Swift books, and has a great fondness for tongue-in-cheek fantasy àla Terry Pratchett, Craig Shaw Gardner and Robert Asprin. |
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