Abhorsen Book Review

by The Wanderer

Author: Garth Nix
Publisher: Harper Collins
Genre: Young Adult, Dark Fantasy
Series: Abhorsen Book Three
Pages: 512

Buy on Amazon!

(Spoilers for the previous two books in the Abhorsen Trilogy are below).

The final installment of Garth Nix’s Abhorsen Trilogy lives up to some lofty expectations.  While I didn’t quite like it as much as Lirael or Sabriel, it was still an excellent conclusion to the series.  As a Young Adult fantasy trilogy this undoubtedly joins Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials and Jonathan Stroud’s Bartimaeus Trilogy as one of greatest Young Adult series’ out there..

Lirael Book Review

by The Wanderer

Author: Garth Nix
Publisher: Harper Collins
Genre: Young Adult, Dark Fantasy
Series: Abhorsen Book Two
Pages: 709

Buy on Amazon!

(Spoilers for Sabriel are below).

Lirael takes the Abhorsen Trilogy in a newer direction with a whole new set of characters and a much longer page count.  Initially taking place some fourteen years after Sabriel and Touchstone defeated Kerrigor, this book focuses on two new narrators: a young Clayer named Lirael who has yet to gain the sight, and Prince Sameth, Sabriel’s son and the Abhorsen in waiting.   With the continued development of an excellent magic system, one of the greatest libraries in worldbuilding, and a great cliff hanger of an ending, Lirael proves to be every bit as imaginative and emotionally powerful as its predecessor.

Sabriel Book Review

by The Wanderer

Author: Garth Nix
Publisher: Harper Collins
Genre: Young Adult, Dark Fantasy
Series: Abhorsen Book One
Pages: 496

Buy on Amazon!

The first installment in Garth Nix’s Young Adult Abhorsen Trilogy is a morbid affair.  This is a trilogy that not only explores typical YA issues like first romances and coming of age, but it also explores less typical issues like death.  By exploring death, I mean there is a lot of it in this book.  Undead and suffering souls are everywhere and the story comes with all the powerful emotions that surround it. The way the subject matter is treated in the plot and how it affects all the characters make this one of the more emotionally intense YA fantasy’s you can read.