Customer Reviews

The Feline Wizard (Wizard in Rhyme, A)

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

 

 

Stasheff returns to the parallel world of wizards, sorcerers, and witches. Where christian ideas become reality. Beware of doing are thinking wrong here, there actually is a hell.

This book continues the story of Balkis. The Princess who can change into a cat. She can also whip out a really potent spell...if only she could rhyme that last line.

The princess is kindnapped due to a prophecy saying she will protect her empire. However, the abduction goes wrong and she is actually sent to the one who can complement her spells. Romance blooms as Balkis and her new love travel back home. As they travel, I felt like I was reading Gullivers Travels: large ants, crytal encrusted caves, and little people who survive off of apple smell alone.

Read and Enjoy!

I have to say that I disagree with the person who gave it two stars. For me, this book was a welcome return to a more readable adventure. The last several books (before this one) have made me find Matthew Mantrell and his family utterly unbelievable. Could I take the fact that he entered a world in which he could do magic? Sure! It's suspension of disbelief... The thing I've had a problem believing is that Matthew and his parents seem to know absolutely everything... poetry, other languages, literature, history, the specifics of every religion known to man... That's what I could not fathom. It stopped me from relating to them on a personal level. Of course, Mr. Stasheff has done his research, but to expect that the characters, who have lives devoted to things other than this, have too is too much.

This book was a refreshing break from that amount of history, religion, etc... Back to a pure adventure, with people, wandering lost through amazing new territory, meeting new people and creatures.

It was the first time in four books that I got caught up in the story and wanted to find out what happened next.

It was _before_ this book that I thought the Wizard in Rhyme series had played itself out, but now I'm not 100% certain.

**A side note. Mr. Stasheff should prevent the publisher from putting that moronic poem as advertisement... "Join our crusade. Your choice will be made. Isn't it time for a wizard in rhyme?" I can tell he didn't write it, and it's just plain awful.**

Continuing the "Wizard in Rhyme" adventures of the Lord High Wizard of Merovence and his friends and family, this volume pairs our hero with a young, female apprentice (with the self-protective ability to transform into a cat and a difficulty coming up with endings for her spells) in order to retrieve his children from a vile kidnapper. Like all the novels in this series, Stasheff does a wonderful job of combining medieval myths and legends with lively, likable characters. However, the story is marred by errors in proof-reading (changing the names of characters or cities back and forth, often several times within a few pages, where paragraphs from earlier drafts with different names seem to have been incorporated without correction). Enjoy the story, but beware those editing mistakes.

Christopher Stasheff has evidently recognized that Matthew Mantrell (Matt) is getting stale and has launched Balkis, the princess girl/cat as the major protagonist in this Wizard in Rhyme fantasy.

Kidnapped by servants of an evil goddess, Balkis turns cat, finds the boy of her dreams, and sets off to find her way home. On the way back, Balkis and Anthony (the boy) see a veritable Gulliver's Travels assortment of strange people, creatures, and places out of medieval myth. The device of having Balkis unable to finish a rhyme and Anthony unable to start one (he was the youngest brother and never allowed to go first) is both amusing and a chance for the two characters to work together.

Meanwhile, Matt rides Stegoman the dragon to the rescue (not that Balkis needs much rescuing). Stegoman finally gets his chance for a little dragon-girl action.

Stasheff always writes an entertaining adventure. Although not as strong as the initial three books in this series (all of which were wonderful), THE FELINE WIZARD is certainly entertaining. If Stasheff continues this series, he may wish to revive some of the early concepts, such as the land's power over its people. These were what elevated the initial novels.

It's an enjoyable read.

1,000 words? Is that all I get? This book was so good. I bought it at around 9 pm and finished it at 5 am. Its a fantasy book, which I am into, and you have to lake that to be able to like it, but I loved it! The romance is great, (not too sappy) the plot it fast paced, and it has a gread ending! VERY RECCOMENDED

THE FELINE WIZARD is one of the latest, the eighth I do believe, in C. Stasheff's the Wizard in Rhyme series and it doesn't disappoint. The secret to keeping a storyline fresh and interesting over an extended number of volumes can be tricky but Stasheff had demonstrated that he has the knack. One such trick is to change the focus or main character of the story while still keeping the same "universe" that has been built up over the past few years. In FELINE WIZARD Balkis, Matt's former apprentice and now princess of Maracanda is the main protagonist having been kidnapped and transported far away from home much to the dismay of the ... Kala Nag who wanted to keep her as far away as possible from "the Other." As with most fairy tales you can guess where the winds of fate took her!

FELINE WIZARD doesn't have the power, originality or freshness of HER MAJESTY'S WIZARD or THE OATHBOUND WIZARD but what would you expect? In all it's a nice, pleasant read filled with action, suspense and romance, a pretty good combination if you ask me.

I'd RECOMMEND it, especially for those who have been following Matt Mantrell for the past few years.

If you like cats and fantasy you'll like it. It's fairly good as far as fantasy books go! I recommend it!

Firstly, please let me say that I am a fan of Stasheff's work, and count some of it among the best written and most enjoyable books I have encountered.

I have only one criticism, and that relates to Stasheff's ongoing series - he keeps turning them out long after he has run out of anything fresh to say. This is the case with the Feline Wizard.

The early books in the Wizard in Rhyme series were fresh, well characterised, well plotted, with reasonably consistant internal logic. All in all, they developed a believable world with an interesting and likable cast of characters.

For the last three books in this series, this trend has weakened to the point where - for a series reader - the series is no longer viable.

Errors in the series internal logic and premise have grown. Matthew Mantrell and friends are frankly tired - with no real effort at character growth or development.

Frankly, at this point the plot is banal. What started out as a reasonably fresh series, has finally degenerated into a piece of mass market pablum.

I can only assume that Stasheff is as tired of it as I am.

I cannot recommend this book, I cannot recommend the two immediately prior to it in the series. I very heartedly recommend the first three as excellent reads.

Please don't judge the series or the author by this book - both are capable of SO MUCH BETTER.

this book like the others by Christopher Stasheff is very interesting to read. Its plot is original and the characters incredible.

This was a really good book. The plot is well done. Anyone who read his other books should buy this one.