The Wizard's Dilemma (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition) [School & Library Binding]

Diane Duane (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 2002 | Age Level: 8 and up | Grade Level: 3 and up

THIS EDITION IS INTENDED FOR USE IN SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES ONLY. When Nita's mother becomes sick with cancer, she feels her only option is to make a deal with the Lone Power, yet the outcome of doing so may be something too great for her to handle on her o

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The fifth title in Diane Duane's Young Wizards series delves deeper into an emotional landscape than any of her previous books (So You Want to Be a Wizard, Deep Wizardry, High Wizardry, and A Wizard Abroad). For the first time ever, friends and wizard partners Nita and Kit seem to be having trouble communicating. They argue over a spell to clean up the pollution in New York's Jones Inlet, and from that point on, they can't connect on anything. Is it adolescence that's tearing them apart or something more profound? Meanwhile, Nita and her family are stunned to discover that her mother has cancer, and there's a possibility that nothing--not surgery, not even wizardry--can fight it. Nita refuses to let her mom go down without a fight, however, and soon she's on a mission that brings her face-to-face with the Lone Power, source of all death in the universe--Nita's worst enemy, and possibly her only hope.

Impressive in its scope, The Wizard's Dilemma, like all the titles in Duane's series, is packed with an intriguing combination of technology and magic that fans of fantasy, science fiction, technology, and even Christian literature will find absolutely gripping. Nita is a complex character, as befits her status as a teenager, not to mention a wizard. Her confusion and self-doubt will be painfully believable to every reader. There are no simple answers in this remarkably philosophical novel. (Ages 12 and older) --Emilie Coulter --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

Gr 6-8-Now 14, Nita bemoans the fact that she "kept running into problems for which wizardry either wasn't an answer, or else was the wrong one. And even when it was the right answer, it never seemed to be a simple one anymore." School is harder than ever before, and her wizarding partnership with her best friend, Kit, has been under stress, when the ultimate blow comes: her mother has intractable brain cancer. As in earlier books in the series, wizardry is an unusual hybrid of science fiction and fantasy conventions, in which interplanetary aliens and parallel uni-verses coexist with spells and talking trees. In this installment, the two friends each face a dilemma: Kit finds he can retreat forever into his own self-created heaven, but at the cost of giving up the fight against evil. Nita learns she can cure her mother's cancer, but only by sacrificing her powers to the Lone One, the source of all unhappiness in the universe. As the maturing wizards learn in the story's moving conclusion, there are no simple answers to decisions like these. A well-crafted plot, occasional dry humor, and appealing main characters will make this novel popular with readers new to the series as well as with Duane's fans.

Beth Wright, Fletcher Free Library, Burlington, VT

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• School & Library Binding: 422 pages
• Publisher: Turtleback (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0613552253
• ISBN-13: 978-0613552257
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,107,900 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Diane Duane was born in New York City -- a descendant of New York's first mayor -- and worked there as a psychiatric nurse before leaving the profession for the only one she loved better, the business of writing. Since the publication of her first novel in 1981, she's written fifty more, not to mention numerous short stories, comics, computer games and screenplays for TV and film, and has picked up the occasional award here and there. (She has also worked with Star Trek in more media than anyone else alive.)

Right now she's probably best known for her "Young Wizards" series of young adult fantasy novels, featuring the New York-based wizards Kit Rodriguez and Nita Callahan -- in business for twenty-five years now, their most recent adventure being described in the ninth YW novel, "A Wizard of Mars" (just released in paperback).

DD shares a two hundred-year-old cottage in the Wicklow Mountains of Ireland with her husband, the Belfast-born novelist and screenwriter Peter Morwood, a laid-back white cat named Goodman, and various overworked computers... an odd but congenial environment for the staging of epic battles between good and evil and the leisurely pursuit of total galactic domination. (And a lot of ethnic cooking: her own favorite foods come from the cuisines of central Europe and the Mediterranean.) In her spare time she gardens (weeding, mostly), studies German and Italian, listens to shortwave and satellite radio, and dabbles in astronomy, computer graphics, iaido, amateur cartography, and desktop publishing ... while also trying to figure out how to make more spare time.

Her favorite color is blue, her favorite food is a weird kind of Swiss scrambled-potato dish called maluns, she was born in a Year of the Dragon, and her sign is "Runway 24 Left, Hold For Clearance."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nita and Kit are back!, May 23, 2001

By 

Jeffrey N. Massie (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Wizard's Dilemma: The Fifth Book in the Young Wizards Series (Hardcover)

After the slight disappointment of A WIZARD ABROAD, Duane is back up to the level of SO YOU WANT TO BE A WIZARD and DEEP WIZARDRY which are the best of this series IMHO. DILEMMA is very nearly up to that mark.

At its best, the Young Wizards series is true sci-fi/fantasy and adolescent fiction at is best, perfectly readable by teenagers and adults alike (for what it's worth, I'm 47!) Duane's characters confront moral dilemmas and learn to make the right choices, living in a world created with a wonderfully whimsical sense of humor and fascinating characters. (Like most series of this kind, these should be read in chronological order - SO YOU WANT ..., DEEP WIZARDRY, HIGH WIZARDRY, A WIZARD ABROAD and then DILEMMA).

Nita and Kit are growing older, losing some of the wizardly power they had at first but gaining insight into the nature and limits of their powers. I've always found Dairine (Nita's sister) a bit hard to take, but here we get an insight into her prickly character that makes her a lot more human.

If you insist on happy endings with all the loose ends tied up, you may not be pleased with the end of this book. I also suspect that Christian fundamentalists may have some problems with the world view, but this line of fiction isn't likely to appeal to that crowd anyway.

Most of fantasy literature is about the things magicians can do; Duane's genius is to write fascinating stories about the things they *can't* do.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The long awaited 5th book in the Series, May 27, 2001

By 

Nancy E. "Nancy" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Wizard's Dilemma: The Fifth Book in the Young Wizards Series (Hardcover)

It's a little while after we left off with Nita and Kit in A Wizard Abroad and they're a little older, a little wiser, and a little more in control. But after a fight they fear that they're divided forever. But after this fight they find themselves immeaditally pulled apart even more as they both embark on seperate journies.

Nita has a lot to deal with when her mother gets sick with a cancer that could kill her. She tries to use her wizardry to help her but soon finds out that the only way to solve it might be to give up eveything she's worked for. Kit's busy too. One day when he's out walking his dog, Ponch, he finds himself in a whole new world, literaly. Can the two pull together in time to solve the problem? Or are they divided for good.

I was nearly jumping out of my seat when I heard that their was going to be a 5th book in this series and now I pray Diane Duane will write a new one soon. She once again brings the charecters we all know and love alive once again. This book is one of the best ones in the series to date (next to Deep Wizardry). I reccomend this book to anyone whose a fan of the Young Wizards Series and I reccomend this series to fans of magic. I'll be sure to read this one again and again.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Old Adults like this series too...., May 16, 2002

By 

"shymrod" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Wizard's Dilemma: The Fifth Book in the Young Wizards Series (Hardcover)

The Young Wizard's series is not just for Young Adults... I was in my 30's when I discovered it. I'm hooked. That said...
This book lives up to the tradition that Ms Duane has created for scenes that are either slyly or blatantly funny, thoughtful, poignant, terrifying, awe-inspiring, shiver-giving, and above all, believable in the context of the story.
Her characters all have their strengths and weaknesses...and they are not static either... one of the subplots deals with Dairine no longer having the incredible power levels she started out with and having to deal with this, not to mention possible loss of her mother and adolescence just around the corner... heavy stuff for an 11 year old who can put 'Created a sentient silicone race' on her resume.
Ms Duane does not fall into the 'Wizardry can solve everything' rut either, she even has Nita muse that while it may be the simple answer sometimes it isn't always the right one.
Her characters may have super powers, and get into some pretty fantastical situations, but they themselves are always believable, real, multidimensional. They make mistakes. They lose their tempers. They misinterpret what someone says, then second-guess themselves about what he/she really meant, and agonize about what they should have said. There is a scene between Nita and her mom that is sweet, touching, and makes you stop and think...how important is it REALLY to be 'right'?
They don't stop being real people with real problems and concerns just because they have extra powers and abilities.
It is not just the Young Adults who can thoroughly enjoy and benefit from reading this series... and it's nice to know that even wizards are just people, (although not necessarily human-type) too.