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Item Barcode | Collection | Call Number | Status | Item Holds |
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| 33607001821845 | Juvenile Fiction | BELL | Searching... Unknown | Searching... Unavailable |
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Summary
Summary
Dayven has passed the test he wanted most desperately to fail -- he's been proven to have the powers of a wizard.
He had promised never to become one of the deceitful, disloyal sorcerers who believe in nothing and alter people's true destinies -- but now he has no choice. Thrown into an apprenticeship with a roguish wizard, Dayven discovers that loyalty and trust are never simple, and wizards are more deceptive than he could ever imagine.
The path that was once clear -- his friendships, his future, his destiny -- is now shadowed with dangerous twists and turns, and the world he knows must change forever.
Reviews (2)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-8-What is loyalty and to whom is it owed? Are our enemies truly as evil as we are taught? Do our leaders really do what is best, or what is expedient? And how can we determine the truth? These themes are explored through the character of Dayven, a 14-year-old Watcherlad to Lord Enar. Growing up in a land where wizards are mistrusted, no boy wants to discover that he has magical powers, yet this is exactly what happens when it is Dayven's turn to be tested. Horrified, he swears he will never join the wizards and agrees to spy on them for Lord Enar. Apprenticed to the seemingly drunken buffoon Reddick, Dayven soon learns that the world is not the black-and-white place he imagined it to be. Enemies turn out to have similar hopes and dreams and Dayven discovers that his own people are not as honorable or well intentioned as he always believed. In order to preserve the ecological equilibrium necessary to sustain the lands of those whom his people have sworn to protect, he must decide whether to stand with the wizards and maintain the balance or cling to what he's been taught is right. Hard questions are asked and answered in a slim book that will find a wide audience and spark much discussion.-Sharon Grover, Arlington County Department of Libraries, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Bell visits many of the same themes as in her The Goblin Wood, but with few of the complexities of that novel. This fable takes place in the walled medieval city of Tharn, where the people mistrust the wizards and view magic as a necessary evil. Dayven has just turned 14 and, like all boys his age, is tested for magical abilities and discovers that he, like his grandmother, possesses the gift. Lord Enar recruits Dayven to join the ranks of the wizards in order to spy on them and to report their intentions; the Tharn are on the brink of war with the neighboring Cenzar, and Lord Enar fears the wizards may be sympathetic to the enemy. Early on, readers learn that Dayven's grandmother was sentenced to death for her betrayal of Tharn, planting a seed that things may not be as they seem. In a predictable turn, the author reveals that the Cenzar are a peaceful, agrarian people who were displaced from their home by the manifest destiny of the Tharn years before. Dayven and his wizard master, Reddick, visit the Cenzar, ostensibly to spy on their military preparations, and the hero learns of their true motive: the wizards are working to help the Cenzar in their peaceful purpose. Unfortunately, the characters here are not as well-rounded as the author's previous cast; the wizards are good-hearted busybodies, the Cenzar peace-loving farmers, and the Tharn come across as destructive bigots. Well-intentioned but thin fare. Ages 10-up. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved