This has been one of my favorite books for nigh on twenty years now. Every so often, I go buy a few copies to give to people I love.

In addition, it irreversibly changed my relationship to the worms I find on the sidewalk. ( )

Have you ever read a book that is so good, the characters so interesting that you wish it would go on and on? That's how I felt about this book and fortunately for me it DID go on and on! This book is 674 pages long and quite rambling, countless times introducing characters that last for a few pages and are never seen again. The wonderful Irish story-telling powers of Pat O'Shea make this work somehow. This book is hard to pidgeon-hole as to which readership it was intended for. It is certainly the longest Young Adult title I've seen. The main characters Pidge and Brigit are only 10 and 5 years old but they act a lot older than that, especialy 5 year old Brigit. There are more mature concepts about the Old Magics that definitely appeal to the adult reader. There are childish characters like talking earwigs and clairvoyant spiders, and outlandish and silly aspects of the triple goddess, The Morrigan, that like to ride motorcycles and torture their own shadows. This is a mish-mash of styles but once again, somehow it works. Maybe if the reader has a mish-mash of tastes as I do, the inconsistencies don't matter. This book is well written and full, I mean brimming, with Irish humor. It has great characters out of Celtic mythology like the Dagda "the Good God", the Morrigan, goddess of death and decay, the Great Queen of Phantoms, embodied as three eccentric and wicked women, Queen Maeve's sons, (the original Talking Heads, if you know what I mean) the Seven Maines, and many others. The plot is the classic good versus evil and spins into motion when 10 year old Pidge discovers a tattered old manuscript in a second hand book shop. The book causes him to accidentally release the Olc Glas, an evil serpent and that in turn causes the race to be on! The Morrigan wants the powers of Olc Glas so that she will have full control of evil and vastly multiply her own evil powers. The Dagda wants Pidge and Brigit to find magical bloodstones that will thwart this awful scheme. In order to get the stones Pidge and Brigit go on a complicated, long and magical quest with many a twist and turn. They are pursued by the hounds of the Morrigan, ravening hunters with a keen sense of smell and tracking abilities, and an insatiable hunger for the chase. All true creatures and friends of the Dagda help the children along their way. The writing is colorful, whitty, exciting, even scary at times and always thoroughly entertaining. This book is in a class by itself and should not be missed by any true lover of fantasy, young or old. ( )

I have read this book so many times it is in tatters. It does not get better than this. ( )

This is an excellent book that centres around traditional Irish mythology. Its main characters are well written and the plot is detailed and well thought out. ( )

This is a fun fairy tale about two children who undertake a journey to battle against Evil for the forces of Good. It's very picaresque, which makes it fun to read out loud because something new and bizarre happens every chapter. ( )