On the whole, I was disappointed in this series by Garth Nix. The first book, Sabriel, was decently engaging. I didn’t love it, but it was clever and the level of the angst of the teen protagonists was bearable. It reads as a stand-alone book, and I enjoyed it more than the latter two books. In the interest of not giving away the plot, I’ll say that it shares elements of the early Chrestomanci books, the His Dark Materials trilogy, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, and Harry Potter. Of course, if I told you which elements, I’d be giving away the plot, wouldn’t I?

Lirael and Abhorsen are a single book split into two volumes (this being, perhaps, before J.K. Rowling acclimated the world to the 700 page children’s book), and as such don’t hang together as well. The plot of the latter books are also slightly more preposterous — even for fantasy — and the teenagers more filled with angst. Overall, I wish I’d stuck with Sabriel and imagined any further adventures on my own.