Conrad's Fate

Finally, a Chrestomanci story that deals with young Christopher, rather than dealing with Cat (when Christopher is the grown-up Chrestomanci). I have been quite intrigued with Christopher and Millie since reading "The Lives of Christopher Chant" about, oh, 10 years ago, and was delighted to read this book and find it was about their teenage years. Of course it is mostly about Conrad, a new character in one of the Related Worlds, but it's got plenty of Christopher to satisfy me. The story was brisk and enjoyable. As usual, one tiny niggle...sometimes in Ms. Jones' books, when she is building up to the climax, a bunch of people come into the story (as with the King's Summoners, police, Gabriel de Witt, etc. near the end of this book) and a lot of things are explained very quickly. I don't consider myself "slow" but I have often felt that Ms. Jones rushes through these explanation scenes a bit too quickly. This book is no exception. The officials all show up, it is quickly announced that some of the people we've been learning about are not what they seem, and then things wind up pretty quickly (people getting taken away, etc.). I always have to go back and carefully reread the parts like that, because they are always a bit sketchy and they seem a bit hastily done. However, that's not going to detract from my 5-star rating, because it only takes a little while to go back and reread that. "Year of the Griffin" used to be my favorite DWJ book because I laughed so much while reading it, but "Conrad's Fate" now has that honor. I laughed a lot with this one, too, plus...it has Christopher Chant... :-)

Diana Wynne-Jones returns to the world(s) of Chrestromanci in the fifth full-length book in her most popular series. Though fans of the dapper magician might be disappointed that he is a supporting character, the title "Conrad's Fate" indicates who is the star of this twisty, hilarious fantasy. Conrad Tesdinic has always been told by his creepy Uncle Alfred that he has bad karma -- apparently he failed to kill someone in a previous life, and will die in a year unless he kills them now. So Conrad finds himself being shipped off to the castle of Stallery, as a servant, to find the person he has to kill. Joining him is Christopher, a smart boy who seems able to work magic, yet doesn't know what a chili pepper is. Christopher eventually tells Conrad that he is a nine-lived magician, and has run away from his own world to find his friend Millie, who has also run away. She's somewhere in the castle, but he can't find her. Peculiar behavior from the count and his family, a troupe of actors, and strange shifts in reality are plaguing Stallery, and Conrad soon finds that he may have more than bad karma to worry about. Diana Wynne-Jones' most popular fantasy series is the Chrestomanci one, which predated the Harry Potter series with its organizational magic and twinkly British humor. It's complex, funny and more than a little strange, and fans of "The Lives of Christopher Chant" will enjoy seeing old favorites -- like Millie and Gabriel -- returning to Jones' writing. Fans of Chrestomanci/Christopher Chant may be slightly disappointed by his secondary role. But then again, the book IS called "Conrad's Fate," so it's hardly surprising that the narrator is Conrad. Conrad himself is a likable kid, with bad luck and a pleasant personality, but who is also plagued by spells and lies from the people around him. And Christopher is showing signs of the dapper, intelligent magician he later becomes. The last parts of the book become somewhat confusing, with several intertangled plotlines, only to have Jones suddenly snap them taut. It's a credit to her that she is able to have a shifting castle, runaway magicians, a knitting witch, a gold-digger, faux nobility and an assassination plot all come to a head simultaneously. And her dialogue ("You pear-shaped freak!") shows that her sense of humor has not dulled with time. At the end of "Conrad's Fate," it's hard not to wonder what is going to happen next in the series. Fortunately, in the meantime, this book is a delightful fantasy mystery.

Diana Wynne-Jones returns to the world(s) of Chrestromanci in the fifth full-length book in her most popular series. Though fans of the dapper magician might be disappointed that he is a supporting character, the title "Conrad's Fate" indicates who is the star of this twisty, hilarious fantasy. Conrad Tesdinic has always been told by his creepy Uncle Alfred that he has bad karma -- apparently he failed to kill someone in a previous life, and will die in a year unless he kills them now. So Conrad finds himself being shipped off to the castle of Stallery, as a servant, to find the person he has to kill. Joining him is Christopher, a smart boy who seems able to work magic, yet doesn't know what a chili pepper is. Christopher eventually tells Conrad that he is a nine-lived magician, and has run away from his own world to find his friend Millie, who has also run away. She's somewhere in the castle, but he can't find her. Peculiar behavior from the count and his family, a troupe of actors, and strange shifts in reality are plaguing Stallery, and Conrad soon finds that he may have more than bad karma to worry about. Diana Wynne-Jones' most popular fantasy series is the Chrestomanci one, which predated the Harry Potter series with its organizational magic and twinkly British humor. It's complex, funny and more than a little strange, and fans of "The Lives of Christopher Chant" will enjoy seeing old favorites -- like Millie and Gabriel -- returning to Jones' writing. Fans of Chrestomanci/Christopher Chant may be slightly disappointed by his secondary role. But then again, the book IS called "Conrad's Fate," so it's hardly surprising that the narrator is Conrad. Conrad himself is a likable kid, with bad luck and a pleasant personality, but who is also plagued by spells and lies from the people around him. And Christopher is showing signs of the dapper, intelligent magician he later becomes. The last parts of the book become somewhat confusing, with several intertangled plotlines, only to have Jones suddenly snap them taut. It's a credit to her that she is able to have a shifting castle, runaway magicians, a knitting witch, a gold-digger, faux nobility and an assassination plot all come to a head simultaneously. And her dialogue ("You pear-shaped freak!") shows that her sense of humor has not dulled with time. At the end of "Conrad's Fate," it's hard not to wonder what is going to happen next in the series. Fortunately, in the meantime, this book is a delightful fantasy mystery.

I love all of Diana Wynne Jones's books, and I was very much looking forward to this "new Chrestomanci book" but was a little disappointed to find that the book was marketed as such when actually the main character is the title character Conrad, and the story is told from Conrad's point-of-view, not Chrestomanci's (Christopher Chant's) point-of-view. However, the tale is funny and unpredictable and shows off Diana Wynne Jones's writing at its best. The story follows Conrad Tesdinic in one of the worlds on Series Seven, where he lives in a town in the English Alps. Conrad's family sends him to work as a servant in Stallery Mansion, the stately home near their village, so he can find out how to prevent his bad Fate from catching up with him. At Stallery, he runs into Christopher Chant, the future Chrestomanci, who has also come to the mansion in the guise of a servant so he can search for his friend Millie. Life in the mansion is very well described and because Christopher and Conrad are servants, you get a very funny insider's sort of view of how things might have worked Below Stairs in a large mansion home in the Edwardian era. One of my favorite running descriptions through the book is how the boys learn "to act like furniture" so as not to disturb members of the Family that they wait on. My one quibble with this book is that I don't think all of the characters are as well developed as they could be. I think that Conrad narrates a fine story, but we never find out much about him as a person. I would have liked to have read more about his sister and the other characters in the mansion such as Hugo, Andrew, and Count Robert. And, for readers aching to know more about how Christopher Chant becomes the vague, glib, clothes-loving adult Chrestomanci of later books, you may be a little disappointed since by the time this story starts he has already picked up some of these characteristics but we don't get much insight into how or why it happened. I liked this book because it was funny and well written, but my favorite Chrestomanci books are still "Charmed Life" and "The Lives of Christopher Chant." If you are looking for good Diana Wynne Jones books, you can't really go wrong with any of them, but some of my favorites are "Fire and Hemlock" and "Howl's Moving Castle." And finally, like the previous reviewer mentioned, there is a brief part at the end of this book that talks about some events that could be made into an entire story of their own -- and hopefully they will be soon, as the next Chrestomanci book to look forward to!

The most glaring deficiency of Conrad's Fate is the fact that it ends and leaves you wanting more--even with the tidy ending and sense of closure for this particular episode. In this Chrestomanci tale we get a first person narrative from Conrad; a twelve-year-old who provides an interesting, thoughtful viewpoint and gives us an exciting look into Series Seven. Accompanying this magical plot are plenty of amusing new characters, well-described places, and enjoyable witticisms. Again, one of the few complaints I have is that a teenaged Christopher (who is yet to become the fabulous Chrestomanci we know in a Charmed Life) becomes a secondary character, and thus we are not as able to know his thoughts as much as one might like. My last complaint is that near the end--no spoilers included--when everything is being neatly wrapped up, we get a glimspe of other events that definetly deserve a book of their own!