Young Writers Society

This series is utter brilliance! There is simply no other way to describe it, just brilliant! These books are about a young girl named Sonea, who lives in a world very different from ours. Ok, here's the Back of Book discription...

[quote]This year, like every other year, the magicians of Imardin gather to purge the city of undesirables. Cloaked in the protection of their sorcery, they move with no fear of the vagrants and miscreants who despise them and their work- until one enraged girl, barley more than a child, hurls a stone at the hated invaders... and effortlessly penetrates their magical shield.

What the Magicians' Guild has long dreaded has finally come to pass. There is someone outside their ranks who possess a raw power beyond imagining, an untrained mage who must be found and schooled before she destroys herself and her city with a force she cannot yet control. [end quote]

This fantasy world was put together with an unimaginably well details, with characters to die for, and the story keeps you guessing. You've got to read it!

I love this series and am friending you on the principle that you've read it.

I really like the new spin it takes on magic (without spoiling it), and the attitudes to magic. You'd almost think it had been written by an anthropologist...

But yes, ridiculously awesome book.

Rubric

Trudi Canavan is definately one of those authors that can get away with creating a completely new world without being too cliche *cough* unlike Paulini *cough*

The Black Magician trilogy is a great series, although I find 'The Magicians' guild' a little slow paced. It's strange that the first book is the least favoured (in my opinion) because usually the first of a trilogy is the best (like Noughts and Crosses). The perception of magic is very well-drafted because I normally hate those fantasies that bog down on magic without explaining the theory as I am strange and picky.

I cried at the end of 'The High Lord' ! It's sooo unfair.

Did you hear that there is going to be a sequel series? With Sonea's son involved? His name is going to be Larkin - which reminds me of gherkins :S

Sequel series? Awesome,I hoped there might be and it was definitely open forit.

As for the High Lord, it was heaps sad, but in a way I'm glad someone had the courage to avoid the classic happy ending, especially when you thought it was just around the corner.

Rubric

Sequel series? Excuse me while I go somewhere far away from people so I can squee in private And yes, brilliant series.

Ah yes, truly brilliant. I loved this. In fact, this is one of the books I keep coming to again and again. Dannyl and Tayend are cute together and I expected Dorrien and Sonea to get together. Still, I enjoyed everything at the end. Even the death scene. Rothen's reaction at the end kept me laughing for ages.

And really? There's going to be a sequel? Yes! I am definitely looking for it. Larkin? Reminds me of Lorlin. I liked Lorlin.

It's a very good series and I believe she is writing a prequel, as regards the war that kept getting referenced throughout the novels.

Her second series, the Circle of Five, I believe it was called, is nowhere near as good.

I loved this! I read it at age I probably shouldn't have, but it kinda became a late childhood favourite. I read her the circle of five too which was very hard to get into but once you were in it was good. I'm such a fantasy nerd now and I swear it's because of this series. Also, she's Australian, like me!

Haha, discrimination!

There are plenty of major Australian fantasy writers though:

Ian Irvine
Trudi Canavan
Kim Wilkins
Tad Williams
Garth Nix
Sara Douglass
Fiona McIntosh
Kate Forsyth
Tony Shillitoe

And that's just naming a few - all of the above are internationally best-selling, fantasy authors. Don't know what it is about the waters here, but we Aussies rock at fantasy.

It's the shiz, yo

I thought they were just big in Australia

Wow, everyone here seems to love this series. I found the first book pretty slow, and I didn't find it any better than mediocre. By the third one however, Trudi Canavan had me really intrigued. I thought that The High Lord was superb, and had some tremendous twists.

I have been debating with myself whether to read her second series -- The age of five, but the reviews look mediocre at best. Maybe I'll buy it anyway . We'll have to see.