Customer Reviews

Wizards: Stories of Magic, Mischief and Mayhem

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I love wizards, be they the unusual, young ones or the old gray-bearded Gandalf/Merlin types. But I and many others Iove wizards. As the title suggests, this is a collection of some of the best wizard stories out there, by some of the best writers of fantasy ever, including but not limited to: Jane Yolen, Ursula Le Guin, T.H. White, C.S. Lewis, George MacDonald, and so on.

Much of this material is excerpted from other books, such as Le Guin's story ("Wizard of Earthsea"), George MacDonald's ("At the Back of the North Wind") and several others. While readers may have heard of some of the books ("Wizard of Earthsea," "Wizard's Hall," the Narnia Books) this is a good introduction to other works by older authors, like T.H. White's excerpt from "Once and Future King," Phillippa Pearce, George MacDonald (who died before Tolkien!), Beowulf (the one excerpt that may be beyond the average 9-12 reader); and a few of those who are simply obscure like Mark Helprin and Nikolai Gogol. (Not all the excerpts are from wizard-related books, tho)

On a non-reading level, this book is beautifully bound with a gorgeous cover, though a little pricey for a paperback, in my humble opinion. Nevertheless, if you are not acquainted with some or all of the authors inside and/or are looking for good wizard stories, look no further. It's a good way to kick off your fantasy reading.

This is a misnamed "survey" compilation of short stories and book excerpts, most of them from the young adult fantasy genre, many of them with no mention of wizards whatsoever. A few excerpts don't even have any overt magic. However, this is not to say that there's nothing worth reading here. There is definitely some classic material here by Roald Dahl, T.H. White, E. Nesbit and many others, but generally only in bite-size chunks - enough to whet the appetite but not satisfy it. If you're looking to sample the work of many children's, fantasy, and children's fantasy authors before diving in on whole books by each, then this anthology serves as a good introduction, especially for complete novices to the genre. But if you're looking to read about wizards specifically, look elsewhere.