Goldenhand is a Lukewarm Return to the Old Kingdom Series

via isdb

It’s been a long time since the main trilogy of the Old Kingdom series ended—the original three books, Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen, were published in 1995, 2001, and 2003 respectively and we’ve only had the occasional short story to tide us over since. But in 2014, author Garth Nix returned to his universe with a prequel installment, Clariel, and ever since then, he’s been making noises about finally giving us a sequel to Abhorsen and following up on the lives of our favorite zombie-killing necromancer ladies. Well, the sequel is finally here, and it’s great. Well, it’s good. Well, it’s… I liked it, at any rate.

Minor spoilers for Goldenhand after the jump.

Magical Mondays: Revisiting the Old Kingdom with Clariel

The long-awaited prequel to Garth Nix’s Old Kingdom trilogy finally came out this past October, but I didn’t get the chance to read it until this past weekend. (My amazing Valentine’s Day plans for myself included cuddling my cat and reading this book.) Clariel turned out to be a great, if sad, exploration both of the more mysterious magics of the Old Kingdom and of Clariel herself, as she was only a minor character in the later books.

Spoilers for Clariel follow below.