Customer Reviews

Deep Secret

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Seldom recently have I simply enjoyed reading a book as much as I enjoyed Diana Wynne Jones' Deep Secret. Jones employs a mixture of engaging characters, interesting fantasy concepts, and a light touch with serious undertones, to create a novel that is infectious and absorbing.

Right from the beginning we know something is up, as narrator Rupert Venables is called away to the Koryfonic Empire, to give his stamp of approval as a Magid to a legal preceding there. Koryfonic Empire? Magid? We are told that the Multiverse consists of worlds arranged in a sort of infinity figure, with one half (including Earth), negative magically (this is the Naywards half). These worlds tend not to believe in magic, and magic is harder to do there. The other (Ayewards) half are positive magically, and creatures such as centaurs can exist there. The Koryfonic Empire is somehow very important, and it occupies the exact middle of the infinity sign. And Magids are some variety of wizard, with the duty to subtly influence events on whatever worlds they are responsible for in the appropriate direction. Rupert is Earth's junior Magid, and he is fresh from helping out in Yugoslavia and Northern Ireland, when he gets sent to the Empire.

This is a bit of a complicated setup, but it's not really necessary to worry about it too much. Rupert is soon engaged in two succession problems. His mentor has died, and he must select a new Magid from among several human candidates. In addition, the Koryfonic Emperor is assassinated, and he has to try to track down the proper heir: a process complicated by the previous Emperor's paranoia, which caused him to hide away his heirs so they wouldn't try to take over before their time. An alternate narrative path starts to follow Maree Mallory, one of the Magid candidates (which ought to be a clue to any reader).

The action converges at a Science Fiction convention. Much of the action is superficially light in tone, including some funny bits involving the difficulty of navigating the hotel's corridors, which reminded me of stories of real world conventions. But at the same time the concerns are deadly serious, and Jones doesn't cheat us there: real mistakes are made, people are really hurt and killed. So it's not just a light-hearted romp, and though it's often funny, Deep Secret is not a comedy.

What it is, is a thoroughly involving book. Jones is one of those natural storytellers: her books compel reading. The characters are real, and very likable. The plot is exciting, and resolved logically. The magical system is lightly sketched, but what we see is interesting and well drawn. The resolution is largely what we expect, but it also involves satisfying surprises. This book kept me up late at night reading, and made we eager for each chance to read another chapter. It's not perfect: the overall setup, though interesting, is a bit strained, and a bit too lightly sketched, which for me reduced the immediacy of some of the events. And structurally there is a slight burp: the book ends, more or less, and then there is an odd sort of coda, which really fills us in on an event from the earlier of the book that we had missed. But Jones finds a way to round up that coda nicely, without causing a muffled end to things. And I came away from this book a satisfied customer. Highly recommended.

The Magids keep the positive and negative magic in balance throughout the Multiverse. Junior Magid Rubert Venables, an Earthling, works the barbaric Koyrfonic Empires where trouble is a way of life. In the large scheme of the Multiverse, a backward series of planets usually means little. However, this group happens to be located at a critical point where the center of the Multiverse twists onto itself. When someone assassinates the Emperor, Rupert has to find the rightful heir even though the previous ruler seems to have killed all of them before a possible chaotic civil war even starts..

However, Rupert has a second problem to deal with at the same time. He has been assigned the task of finding the replacement to his own mentor, who just died. Rupert must go to Earth and select the most competent of the junior Magids (including himself) to become the new Magid of the planet. He meets with the five contenders at a SF convention, but other forces not quite as friendly as the hostile candidates are also there.

DEEP SECRET is a great SF tale that fans will take much pleasure in reading. The story line is exciting, complex, and unique as only Diana Wynne Jones can do. The eccentric cast of characters seem real as they add humor and make magic appear to be part of the scientific realm. Anyone who wants something a bit different, should try this novel and hopefully any future Multiverse books.

Harriet Klausner

I would say this is the first time DWJ has written an adult book which is fully as good as her best juvenile books - which I mean as a very high compliment indeed. The many complications are wonderfully woven together and beautifully resolved, while still keeping to the frantic pace of her best plotting. There is a theme of deep secrets coming to light (life), which gives the plot more-than-causal coherency.

Diana Wynne Jones's Deep Secret is a wonderful novel. Though some have claimed it lacks depth or is somewhat simplistic, Deep Secret is an engaging and realistic treatment of the classic multiple universes theme - with a magical twist.

Rupert Venables, one of the two primary characters in the novel, is a young Magid - one of a select group of magic-users charged with the care and improvement of the many worlds of the infinity-shaped magical universe. When he sets out to find a replacement for his dead (but perhaps not completely gone) mentor, he finds himself tangled in a complex set of problems involving the Koryfonic Empire's new heir, several centaurs, and a fantasy convention.

Jones, as always, provides amazing characterization in this novel, though at times Rupert Venables can seem far older than his twenty-six years. Maree Mallory, the other main character, is equally as quirky and compelling, and I found myself drawn to both of their narrative voices. I was more than satisfied with the complex plot, and Jones's choice to set the book largely at a convention was a stroke of brilliance. Not only does it allow her to introduce and illustrate a number of themes about the human need to both congregate in groups of kindred spirits and set oneself apart from the rest of humanity, she characterizes the spirit of a fantasy con so well it makes the reader wish fervently to attend one.

With one of the most satisfying endings I've encountered in a Jones book, this novel really is one of her best.

The only complaint I have, is that in the Starscape Books edition, ostensibly published for young adults, they've made a couple of small, but nevertheless distracting and unecessarily prudish edits. Early in the book they replace the original word "damn" with "darn," the lesser of the two changes, but later on they editors rob a passage of its importance when they replace the word "erotic" with "extraordinary" in the sentence, "I stood up with her easily and was puzzled to discover that holding her like this, light, limp and frost cold, was one of the most erotic experiences I have ever had," (231). I'm sorry, but if your young adult reader cannot handle the word "erotic," then he or she probably won't understand the impact of the word regardless. These small edits are serious errors of judgment on the part of the editors.

Having read every other Diana Wynne Jones title as a child, and shamefacedly continuing to check them out of the library all the way through university, until I could finally afford to buy them all, I was extremely excited when I discovered this book, written for adults. The difference between this and Jones' children's books is actually minimal. The same sense of fun, the same intricate and well-realized world, the matter-of-fact magic--the only difference is a small scattering of sexual innuendo (and a fairly subtle suggestion of Rupert having an affair with his brother's wife *after* they were married--don't worry, I'm not giving anything away).

Computer game designers, graphic novel readers and Trekkies will enjoy the fantasy writers' convention where much of the action takes place. I think Neil Gaiman makes a small cameo?? Jones has been writing fantasy for, well, most of my lifetime anyway, and she shows a loving and detailed sense of the fantasy subculture. However, readers who aren't part of that subculture shouldn't be turned off, as the references are liberally spiced with Jones' own brilliant invention.

Jones seems to be enjoying a new popularity in North America, maybe due to the similarities with JK Rowling. I would urge readers who enjoy Deep Secret to pick up some of the kids' titles as well, as they're all written to the same high standard.

I wasn't sure what to expect when I heard that Diana Wynne Jones had started writing books for adults. But Deep Secret seems no different from her children's books - not that that's a bad thing! Once again she's written a truly terrific book. I couldn't put it down and it had me laughing out loud. The characters are wonderful and there's a lovely love story running through it. I now have two ambitions in life - to be a Magid and to meet a centaur. Read Deep Secret and you will too!

I have enjoyed Diana Wynne Jones for years, and until recently I thought that Howel's Moving Castle was the best I would ever read by her. Now it's having to fight for the title. This book is very good, extremely engaging, and well-written. The characters are unique and well characterized, and the different worlds that this is set on are varied and interesting as well. Our protagonists are quirky and fun, and the villans are well worth them. I would highly recommend this book to anyone.

If you liked The Merlin Conspiracy, you'll like this! In fact, if you haven't read The Merlin Conspiracy yet but it's on your list, I highly recommend you tear through this first. Nick Mallory is introduced in this book, which takes place a year prior to The Merlin Conspiracy.
But although Nick plays a key role, this book is (mostly) about Rupert Venables. Rupert is a magid, which is a wizard that travels through the universe making sure everything goes as its supposed to on orders from "Them Up There". Rupert is a magid to parts of Earth as well as the Korfyros Empire.
Now don't get thrown in the beginning when quite a few people die. I should add not to get thrown later on in Chapter 16 when more people do too.
One of the people who die is Stan, Rupert's mentor, who "stays behind" awhile longer in order to advise Rupert on sponsering a new magid.
Finding a new magid, and the sudden assinasion of the Korfyros emporer, who's heir is nearly impossible to find, although it's something he's been asked to do, is hard enough on anyone. But in order to decide who he's going to sponser as a magid, he must have his 5 canidates all meet at a hotel in which a Fantasy/Sci-Fi convention is occuring. And someone is trying to kill off the heirs when they ARE found. PLUS most of his canidates are either completely insane or completely annoying. And he despises the fifth one, Maree Mallory. Or does he?
We also hear a bit from Maree. Nick finishes the book up, but mostly we see the story from Rupert's point of view.
This is a wonderful book and leaves you wishing there was more as you turn the last page.

Or, for that matter, Neil Gaiman, Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, etc. ad infinitum? She is certainly in their league, having already written four of the best YA books ever: Hexwood, Howl's Moving Castle, Castle in the Air, and Fire and Hemlock. She's a damn genius, wildly clever and funny, and a deep, unsentimental romantic to boot. And Deep Secret is one of her best: a hilarious send-up of science fiction cons and a wonderful tale of Magids who "tend" worlds throughout the universe. Rupert Venables, her male protagonist, is everything a slavering Anglophile could ever want: diffident, self-conscious, witty, by turns outraged and cowed -- he's wonderful. And her female protagonists aren't cookie-cutter hotties, either. Like the resourceful but dumpy Ann in Hexwood, DS's heroine Maree is insufferable, untidy, shrewd, brave and totally endearing. DWJ's novels are like a tonic -- they come out of left field, are totally delightful and they make you feel, for at least a day or so, that there is some order in the universe.

Rupert Venables has some real trouble. All throughout the linked worlds of the Multiverse, magic is controlled by powerful magicians known as Magids, and Rupert is the Junior Magid assigned to earth (one of the magically negative worlds, where magic is hard to do and people tend not to believe in it) and to the Koryfonic Empire (magically positive, a place where creatures like centaurs can and do exist).

The Empire is in revolt, the old emperor having died without appointing a successor, and Rupert needs to keep things from falling apart entirely until the right heir can be found. Meanwhile, back on earth, he needs to find a successor of his own, as the Senior Magid has died and left him in charge and in need of a Junior. He arranges to have all the likely candidates meet at, of all places, a science fiction convention. Things are pretty chaotic for Rupert, dashing back and forth between his two worlds, but when the magic from one world starts leaking into the other, that's when things really get crazy...

Diana Wynne Jones again spins an absorbing, amusing, and oddly touching fantasy in which the magical and the all too real exist side-by-side. This book, unlike many of her earlier titles, is targeted at an adult audience, but her older characters are just as complex and engaging as the younger ones from her children's and young adult novels.The plot is a bit convoluted, but all of the elements eventually come together, and on the whole the book makes for a fun but thoroughly satisfying read.