Wizards at War: The Eighth Book in the Young Wizards Series (8)

Wizards at War (2005) is the eighth novel in the Young Wizards series, following Wizard's Holiday. In the previous volume, Nita, Kit and Ponch go on excursus to Alaalu and three other wizards -- Sker'ret the centipede, Filif the tree and Roshaun the humanoid King -- come to live in the Callahan basement. Dairine and her temporary house guests notice a little overpressure problem in the Sun and fix it. Meanwhile, Nita, Kit and Ponch discover a glitch in the Alaalid Choice and bring it to the attention of the only living wizard on Alaalu. Quelt modifies the conditions of the Choice and every Alaalid, living or dead, soon dematerializes and takes off for parts unknown. In this novel, Nita, Kit and Ponch are again called upon to save the universe, this time from an intrusion of living dark matter -- the Pullulus -- that has caused spacetime to expand more rapidly. This effect is also adversely affecting the minds of everyone, especially those past latency, and older people everywhere are becoming more bellicose. Even worse, older wizards are losing their powers and are even forgetting their errantry. Nita immediately suspects the Lone Power, but her Seniors point out that the Pullulus are hurting It as much as anyone else. Of course, Nita soon learns that It is using the dark matter as a diversion while searching for the embodiment of another Power equivalent to It, yet on the side of Light. The young wizards transit to the Moon and discover old friends, including Darryl and Ronan. Then they transit beyond to find the source of this new threat. Dairine, Spot and Roshaun travel to the Motherboard to collect data. Nita, Kit, Ponch, Sker'ret and Filif travel to Crossings to throw the Lone Power off their trail, but find that normal traffic there has been disrupted; Sker'ret also discovers his ancestor's personality is abnormally changed. Later Nita discovers an unexpected ally -- Carmela -- at Crossing. Carmela is *not* a wizard, but has some of the attributes, including fluency in Speech and a powerful weapon. Kit's reaction to his sister's presence is beyond shock; he makes like a motorboat: but . . . but . . . but. This novel covers some familiar ground, but also takes the young wizards to Rashah, where the Lone Power has long ago won the Choice. Every native has an avatar of It within them and the King is totally dominated by Its avatar. Luckily, the King is not fully empowered or Nita and friends could have been foiled as soon as they reached the planet. This reviewer has one technical quibble about the plot: physicists speculate that nonobservable mass -- i.e., dark matter -- adds to the gravitational attraction of the universe as a whole. Such additional mass would slow down the expansion of the universe and could eventually cause a contraction leading to the Big Crunch. This plot assumes the reverse. Still this series is fantasy, so herein some type of dark matter might cause increased expansion of the universe instead

This is the eighth book in the "Young Wizards" series by Diane Duane. While it does stand on its own pretty easily, you'll definitely have a deeper understanding of the characters if you've read at least one previous book in the series. The page count in each book has been growing steadily, and this book is longer than any previous book in the series by almost 100 pages. Despite the length, the pace keeps moving well. The overall story line is the same as the previous books: a battle between good and evil and the choice between freedom and slavery. Ms. Duane's writing paints clear pictures of scenery, and the characters are lively with shared history and interpersonal relationships. I think this is the first Young Wizards book that made me cry, as an important character dies. In summary, if you're new to the Series, you can read this volume or start at the beginning ... you won't be toooo lost if you start here, but you won't be getting the full experience either. If you've read some of the other books, definitely add this one to your collection.

Just because there is 'magic' involved, this series has been compared with that of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter. That is too simplistic a comparison (rather like comparing Bram Stoker's Dracula to Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's le Comte de Saint-Germain). Though both series have magic as a force extant in the real world, how it is used is completely different. Ms Rowling's characters use it mostly as a convenience, while for Ms Duane's characters it is more of a tool to accomplish very difficult tasks that (hopefully) slow down the progression of entropy. Big difference there. I won't try to summarize this book, don't want to put in spoilers. It has more subplot than its predeccessors, with relationships between the various characters becoming more complex. The original Kit/Nita dynamic, while strong as ever, moves upstage a bit, making way for the newer, sometimes spiky combinations of Dairine/Roshaun, Kit/Ponch, Kit/Carmela, Ronan/'Michael', Carmela/Ronan, and Nita as reluctant, inadvertant sporadic 'foreteller' and Greek chorus. There is the expected (at least for me) laugh-out-loud scenes that come without warning when Ms. Duane turns things on their ear, as well as the shivers-and-tears-in-the-eyes scenes that aren't necessarily sad. There is loss. There is joy. There is growth, and redemption, and surprise, and determination...and there is also more than a hint that there will be another story in this series.

I'm a teen's mom. I've read the other books in this series as my teen son did. This book brings in characters from earlier books, so I would NOT recommend that this book be the first read in the series. This book, along with the earlier books involves ethics. This is all too rare in teen's choices in reading. Each wizard, sometime as a child, was offered an opportunity to take the Wizard's Oath, then submit to an ordeal. This is when a wizard has the most raw power available - untempered yet by experience and need for control. Adults are brought into the books as Senior Wizards, mentors for the children. It is a wonderful way of explaining why the children are asked to save or mend parts of the universe when adults cannot. In this book, the stakes are even higher. The adults forget their magic in an evolving crisis with the whole universe at stake. All young wizards, from earth and far away galaxies, as well as other species such as cats and whales get involved. Some of the characters that were important in earlier books are prepared to give their lives for this battle. Some do, some are transformed in some very interesting twists. As each book ended, I wondered how the author could top that book. And then, I was delighted by the next book written, as was true this time.

I love the Young Wizards series. It's probably my favorite series of all time. I stumbled upon it by accident and I am really glad that I did. I think that this one was the best so far. It was long which is a plus. I always like long books a lot can happen in the pages. This one especially was filled with action and adventure and I loved it! A lot of the events were totally unpredictable and when I read them I had to just sit there for a second asking if it really happened. Any fan of this series will love this one as well. I would definitly recommend this.