JANUARY READ - SPOILERS - The Magician's Guild

Sorry! I had this posted in the wrong group.

I've finished it but I still need to do my mostly positive review. Maybe tomorrow!

The magician's guild is a classic example of a popcorn read for me. I devoured it, needing to keep reading "just one more" chapter, until I reached the end. But instead of feeling satisfied, I realised that most of what I'd just taken in was as light and insubstantial as air. The characters are pleasant (mostly) but not particularly deep or complex, the worldbuilding is fairly standard for a fantasy, and the plot was very predictable. Too much of the book was taken up with Sonea trying to hide from the magicians, when we all knew that she would end up at the guild anyway. None of the events or relationships from that section of the book have a part to play later in the trilogy, that I can remember, so there is essentially no point to it other than to reinforce the fact that Sonea and the common folk don't trust mages, and the mages don't like commoners. Things got more interesting once she arrived at the guild, but even then there weren't really any surprises in store. Did we really think she was going to get thrown back onto the streets at any point? The mystery surrounding the High Lord is an obvious hook for the next installment, but I shan't comment any further on that as I know that Morphy at least is planning to read on. I think I liked The novice best of the trilogy but that's because it's basically a school story with magic.

I can totally see why Canavan is so popular because it really is gripping and easy to read and feel a part of the action. But I find I'm hungry for something more substantial afterwards.

My micro-review:

"Enjoyable first book in a trilogy. The next book is already in transit at the library. Engaging with a strong female protagonist. The constant hiding and running in the first half of the book was a wee bit annoying. Solid world-building. Straight-forward plot."

2: That sort of describes how I felt about it. I read all three, and I'm pretty sure I read them all in a row, but in hindsight, I didn't think they were very good. I still read all of them though... I don't remember too much about it, except that I thought the ending was stupid.

I remember liking these well enough when I read them years ago, but the romantic subplot that comes up in the later books (maybe only the last one?) SPOILER where Sonea becomes involved with a much older man who was her legal guardian at one time and the ending SPOILER where he dies and she finds out she's pregnant from like the one time they slept together is enough to stop me from re-reading it, I think.

I do remember liking the exploration of the magic in the Guild, though I was somewhat surprised looking over reviews and plot summaries that I don't seem to remember much of anything else that happened than the magic and the romance subplot. Maybe that's another attribute of a popcorn book?

The opening with Sonea in the marketplace reminded me strongly of the beginning of Louise Cooper's The Initiate at the time, but having recently re-read The Initiate they aren't much alike at all...

A coworker lent me Canavan's Priestess of the White last year, which I had always wanted to read, but I put it down in the middle because I saw the romance playing out with the same power dynamics I disliked. The SPOILER guy who is some variation of parent/guardian/teacher/mentor to a much younger girl and then they fall in love when she comes of age as an adult trope is just very much not my thing. (Also I immensely disliked the point of view characters besides Auraya, which didn't help.)

Has anyone read the prequel The Magician's Apprentice or the sequel Traitor Spy trilogy? I've had vague plans to read the latter, but after Priestess of the White I'm not sure, and judging from reviews it seems like Sonea and the exploration of magic, the elements I'd been most interested in, are pretty much sidelined in favor of a political intrigue plot with her son, Dannyl, and something with Cery's thieves' guild politics.

>5 sandstone78:: I read all of the Age of the Five trilogy for some reason, and strongly disliked it. I predicted the main plot twist about a book before it was revealed, and like you I really didn't like the characters or their relationships. I do have The magician's apprentice on Mount Tbr and will give it a try sooner or later.

One thing I did like about this trilogy is SPOILER that we have a major character who discovers and explores his homosexuality something that many mainstream fantasy writers still don't include.

#5 - I think I've read all of her works, I might be missing the latest one. I greatly prefered the Age of Five over the others, and didn't find that the characters relationship played out as you suspect - from memory anyway. There was a lot more moral ambiguity about what is the right course of action.

What I find most annoying about Trudi's writing was her habit of renaming normal animals without giving them any novel properties. The spiders and horses and whatever, were perfectly as we'd expect them to be, but given a new name.

The magic os is pretty much all decided within the inital trilogy so there are limits on the furtehr work that they can do, but int he sequels there are some discoveries of other new forms of magic. I do like that Trudi has carefully balanced the magic so that it can't do anything and everything at once but is limited by various means.

I agree that it is mostly popcorn reading, but fun. Age of Five is slightly better, and I wish she'd write more in that vein. Also agree that The Novice is the best of the three in the initial trilogy.

>6 Sakerfalcon: Your spoiler was one of the plot elements I had completely forgotten until I read the summary, much to my bemusement. I would have thought that would have been a plot element I would remember, but evidently not.

However, while it is nice to see, I do find it awfully convenient that SPOILER such characters almost invariably come in such convenient pairs, as if every person attracted to people of their own gender has a convenient friend or acquaintance of their preferred gender who is secretly holding feelings for them and also happens to be romantically compatible with them as well though. That is unfortunately not exactly how it works in real life, for most people at least...

I'd be curious to see what you think of The Magician's Apprentice once you get around to it. I'd somehow gotten the impression that it was about Sonea's parents, but it looks like it's set quite a bit earlier than that.

>7 reading_fox: Hmm, it could have been after I stopped most of the way through the first book, or I could also have missed something- as far as I remember from what I read their religious/social affiliations re the Dreamweavers were a much bigger deal.

Thanks for the information about the black mage sequel trilogy- I found that my local library has them, so I may give them a try from there at some point. I saw she has a new apparently unrelated series beginning this year as well.

I do agree completely about the renaming animals though.