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Time Of Trial (2009)

by Michael Pryor(Favorite Author)

4.21 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

1741663083 (ISBN13: 9781741663082)

languge

English

genre

Fantasy

publisher

Random House Australia

series

The Laws of Magic

review 1: This fourth instalment in the adventures of Aubrey, George and Caroline took me longer to get through then each of the previous ones did. I struggled to be absorbed in the unfolding story and found much of what happened to be so coincidental as to verge on the ridiculous. One aspect of Time of Trial that particularly disappointed me was the lack of any clear motivating plotline. The characters have a vague plan to confront their enemy (the vile Dr Mordecai Tremaine, intent on bringing the world to war), but much of what occurs during the novel seems to happen to them, rather than the characters being the controllers of their own lives. After foiling a particularly insidious plot of Tremaine’s, Aubrey, Caroline and George decide to travel to Holmland (Germany) and confron... moret their enemy on their own terms. Along the way they get embroiled in various espionage plots, ghost hunts and assassination attempts, only to find themselves facing their enemy earlier than anticipated. This was an action-packed novel; I just would have liked it to be more focused and controlled, with more of Aubrey Fitzwilliam tenacity that I have come to enjoy.
review 2: If you haven't yet discovered the Laws of Magic series by Michael Pryor, grab the first volume and start reading immediately. Set on an alternate, magic-wielding Earth in the years just prior to the start of WWI (or so we may infer from events), they follow the adventures of Aubrey Fitzwilliam, son of the Prime Minister of Albion, and his friends George Doyle and Caroline Hepworth. Although there are steampunk elements - zeppelins, magic, the English/Albionish setting - the series is characterised by a Wodehousian flair for language, humour and intrigue, though with events of a much larger scale than either Jeeves or Bertie Wooster ever managed. Pryor knows this world and its inhabitants backwards: every volume has been full of warmth, adventure, wit and the wisdom of human nature. Time of Trial carried on this tradition with aplomb, and I cannot wait for the next instalment. Definitely one of the best YA series available! less

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