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Diadem Worlds of Magic #7
Book of War
When Helaine was whisked away from home, she never got a chance to say goodbye. Now she's homesick and worried about her family. As the daughter of prominent Lord Votrin, Helaine knows her sudden departure ruined her father's plans to forge an important alliance with another township-an agreement that promised Helaine's hand in marriage.
Score, Pixel, and two unicorn friends accompany Helaine to Ordin-a medieval planet of high-brow nobles, oppressed peasants, and endless battles over land. Upon finding her home, Castle Votrin, under siege by the Border Lords, Helaine vows to make it up to her father. With help from Jenna-a pretty, spell-working healer with a crush on Pixel-they struggle against angry villagers, giant insects, and pillaging soldiers to find a way to save Helaine's home and her family honor.
Score, Pixel, and two unicorn friends accompany Helaine to Ordin-a medieval planet of high-brow nobles, oppressed peasants, and endless battles over land. Upon finding her home, Castle Votrin, under siege by the Border Lords, Helaine vows to make it up to her father. With help from Jenna-a pretty, spell-working healer with a crush on Pixel-they struggle against angry villagers, giant insects, and pillaging soldiers to find a way to save Helaine's home and her family honor.
264 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2005
About the author
John Peel
445 books167 followersJohn Peel is the author of Doctor Who books and comic strips. Notably, he wrote the first original Doctor Who novel, Timewyrm: Genesys, to launch the Virgin New Adventures line. In the early 1990s he was commissioned by Target Books to write novelisations of several key Terry Nation Dalek stories of the 1960s after the rights were finally worked out. He later wrote several more original Daleks novels.
He has the distinction of being one of only three authors credited on a Target novelisation who had not either written a story for the TV series or been a part of the production team (the others were Nigel Robinson and Alison Bingeman).
Outside of Doctor Who, Peel has also written novels for the Star Trek franchise. Under the pseudonym "John Vincent", he wrote novelisations based upon episodes of the 1990s TV series James Bond Jr..
He has the distinction of being one of only three authors credited on a Target novelisation who had not either written a story for the TV series or been a part of the production team (the others were Nigel Robinson and Alison Bingeman).
Outside of Doctor Who, Peel has also written novels for the Star Trek franchise. Under the pseudonym "John Vincent", he wrote novelisations based upon episodes of the 1990s TV series James Bond Jr..
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 2, 2010
I was a fan of the first 6 books when they were written more than 10 years ago. I was about 11 then. You can probably imagine my shock when I, now 23, discovered that John Peel had resumed the series in 2005. I was so excited to see what new adventures the kids would experience but...I have to say I feel let down. The whole feel is completely different from the original 6. This is understandable since so much time has passed between books and it's to be expected that a writer's style would change somewhat. And after so much time my taste in books has matured as well so I would definitely see things differently. I reread the first book, just to see if the magic had died with age, and I was just as enchanted now as I was back then.
All in all, I like the book because it continues with the series that first got me to like reading. The actual story was alright, not great, but the part I really enjoyed was the character development. Finally, I can see these kids grow up into young adults.
All in all, I like the book because it continues with the series that first got me to like reading. The actual story was alright, not great, but the part I really enjoyed was the character development. Finally, I can see these kids grow up into young adults.
September 12, 2012
Out of the entire series with score, and my favorite friends my favorite book would have to be this one. Sort of reminded me of harry potter and the goblet of fire with the appeal of a sense of cheer and enlightenment after so much darkness and fear and stress these characters had gone through it was nice to finally see them in a lighter note. A place where i personally would like to be in (the medieval era) where there were knights and queens, and just learning to battle and be a rebel, i truly love this book, i like the switch of events were coupling occurs, so a tad bit of love thrown in the mix, but i also enjoyed the clues they solved through this book, it seems the author truly thought through this series and decided "hey im going to be so AWESOME that i am going to create these clues so the reader gets to think of their own solutions and go from there...BAM masterpiece!" I truly loved jenna as a character and i cant wait to read this once again =)
March 11, 2024
The Diadem series had its ups and downs, but when it ended its initial six-book run with Scholastic in 1998, there weren't really any major lingering plot threads that made its continuation seem likely or at all necessary from a creative standpoint. Surprisingly, the sequence did later get revived by the publisher Llewellyn, with reprints of the original stories and the release of four subsequent sequels, beginning with this one in 2005 (all under the new series subtitle, Worlds of Magic).
The primary task of this volume, then, is to justify its own existence and convince readers that the basic premise of the franchise still has legs. It's also an opportunity for author John Peel to flex his talents, showing both how he's grown as a writer in the years away and how he was probably constrained by his previous editors. Thus, although it's not especially evident how much time has elapsed since we met our three returning protagonists, they feel like richer and more mature characters -- perhaps in their mid-to-upper teens now, rather than the tweens they were to start. The tone of the narrative around them has also deepened, to the point where I'd classify this and the remaining novels as Young Adult fiction instead of middle-grade like what came before. (At long last, all the hokey puzzles and speech distortions are gone!) It's a glow-up I love to see.
This installment finds the trio of magic-users journeying to Helaine's homeworld, where we're reminded that she left considerable unfinished business, including an arranged marriage betrothal, when she was first whisked away on her adventures. Although the feisty heroine has no intention of going through with the wedding, she regrets breaking her father's agreement and opening him up to political fallout in the form of several rival lords now besieging his castle. A large part of the tale thus involves them mending that parent-child bond, with him eventually coming to respect and accept her as a warrior despite how it flies in the face of their medieval culture's prescribed gender roles. This isn't as strong an outing as Score's return to Earth in Book 5 -- among other issues, it's bizarre that we don't hear anything about the girl's swordmaster Borigen, an even more important relationship in her original backstory -- and the worldbuilding on Ordin isn't particularly distinctive. But the character interactions are pretty worthwhile.
This title also introduces a new viewpoint protagonist Jenna, who soon joins the team with her healing powers. She's the weakest element of the reboot so far in that she's transparently here just to be a romantic interest for Pixel, with the two of them basically falling for each other at first sight, saying nice things while blushing a lot, and then kissing a few times. At least he's finally over his old crush on Helaine, whose slow-burn mutual attraction with Score continues to develop nicely. I don't have much patience for the stammering lovebirds in this book, but the others indicate why they work well as a couple despite all their bickering, as they continually push one another to improve their respective flaws. For Score, that's his cowardice and rude manners; for Helaine, it's her arrogance and the surprising degree of classism / racism she directs at Jenna for being a peasant. (The text describes the latter as having light brown skin, though the cover artist at Llewellyn doesn't seem to have noticed.) Score and Helaine grow by holding each other accountable, and it makes their dynamic of trust feel real and gratifyingly earned throughout.
The teens ultimately resolve the military conflict in an ingenious way, and the conclusion opens up new questions about Score's parentage as well as the role that Jenna will play in events moving forward, without ending on the sort of sudden random cliffhanger that Peel had sometimes employed in the past. Book of War isn't a stone-cold classic by any means, but as a proof-of-concept for a series restart, it definitely gets its readers back on-board.
[Content warning for slavery, gore, and implied threat of sexual violence.]
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The primary task of this volume, then, is to justify its own existence and convince readers that the basic premise of the franchise still has legs. It's also an opportunity for author John Peel to flex his talents, showing both how he's grown as a writer in the years away and how he was probably constrained by his previous editors. Thus, although it's not especially evident how much time has elapsed since we met our three returning protagonists, they feel like richer and more mature characters -- perhaps in their mid-to-upper teens now, rather than the tweens they were to start. The tone of the narrative around them has also deepened, to the point where I'd classify this and the remaining novels as Young Adult fiction instead of middle-grade like what came before. (At long last, all the hokey puzzles and speech distortions are gone!) It's a glow-up I love to see.
This installment finds the trio of magic-users journeying to Helaine's homeworld, where we're reminded that she left considerable unfinished business, including an arranged marriage betrothal, when she was first whisked away on her adventures. Although the feisty heroine has no intention of going through with the wedding, she regrets breaking her father's agreement and opening him up to political fallout in the form of several rival lords now besieging his castle. A large part of the tale thus involves them mending that parent-child bond, with him eventually coming to respect and accept her as a warrior despite how it flies in the face of their medieval culture's prescribed gender roles. This isn't as strong an outing as Score's return to Earth in Book 5 -- among other issues, it's bizarre that we don't hear anything about the girl's swordmaster Borigen, an even more important relationship in her original backstory -- and the worldbuilding on Ordin isn't particularly distinctive. But the character interactions are pretty worthwhile.
This title also introduces a new viewpoint protagonist Jenna, who soon joins the team with her healing powers. She's the weakest element of the reboot so far in that she's transparently here just to be a romantic interest for Pixel, with the two of them basically falling for each other at first sight, saying nice things while blushing a lot, and then kissing a few times. At least he's finally over his old crush on Helaine, whose slow-burn mutual attraction with Score continues to develop nicely. I don't have much patience for the stammering lovebirds in this book, but the others indicate why they work well as a couple despite all their bickering, as they continually push one another to improve their respective flaws. For Score, that's his cowardice and rude manners; for Helaine, it's her arrogance and the surprising degree of classism / racism she directs at Jenna for being a peasant. (The text describes the latter as having light brown skin, though the cover artist at Llewellyn doesn't seem to have noticed.) Score and Helaine grow by holding each other accountable, and it makes their dynamic of trust feel real and gratifyingly earned throughout.
The teens ultimately resolve the military conflict in an ingenious way, and the conclusion opens up new questions about Score's parentage as well as the role that Jenna will play in events moving forward, without ending on the sort of sudden random cliffhanger that Peel had sometimes employed in the past. Book of War isn't a stone-cold classic by any means, but as a proof-of-concept for a series restart, it definitely gets its readers back on-board.
[Content warning for slavery, gore, and implied threat of sexual violence.]
Like this review?
--Throw me a quick one-time donation here!
https://ko-fi.com/lesserjoke
--Subscribe here to support my writing and weigh in on what I read next!
https://patreon.com/lesserjoke
--Follow along on Goodreads here!
https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6...
--Or click here to browse through all my reviews!
https://lesserjoke.home.blog
February 23, 2010
Diadem #7: Book of War, by John Peel
In "Book of War," it's Helaine's turn to return to her home planet of Ordin. After having escaped an arranged marriage on a Medieval Ages era world, Helaine Votrin suffered from the guilt of abandoning her family and her duty. Score and Pixel accompany her back home, and naturally the three pop into a dangerous situation: Votrin castle is under siege; war is imminent.
Feeling even guiltier now for leaving, Helaine is determined to do what she can to resolve the situation. She and Score set off on her secret plan, while Pixel attempts to solve a 500-year-old mystery.
For the first time in the Diadem series, Peel introduces a new main character, Jenna, a peasant hedge-witch. She is revealed to be another magician with powers matching that of Score, Helaine, and Pixel, and now the trio becomes a quartet.
For me, "Book of War" is one of the weaker books in the Diadem series. I didn't particularly like the addition of a new main character, nor the more prominent romance, but after I read the next book in the series I understood why she was brought in. So if you're like me and didn't like Jenna at first, it gets better, so hang in there.
3/5.
In "Book of War," it's Helaine's turn to return to her home planet of Ordin. After having escaped an arranged marriage on a Medieval Ages era world, Helaine Votrin suffered from the guilt of abandoning her family and her duty. Score and Pixel accompany her back home, and naturally the three pop into a dangerous situation: Votrin castle is under siege; war is imminent.
Feeling even guiltier now for leaving, Helaine is determined to do what she can to resolve the situation. She and Score set off on her secret plan, while Pixel attempts to solve a 500-year-old mystery.
For the first time in the Diadem series, Peel introduces a new main character, Jenna, a peasant hedge-witch. She is revealed to be another magician with powers matching that of Score, Helaine, and Pixel, and now the trio becomes a quartet.
For me, "Book of War" is one of the weaker books in the Diadem series. I didn't particularly like the addition of a new main character, nor the more prominent romance, but after I read the next book in the series I understood why she was brought in. So if you're like me and didn't like Jenna at first, it gets better, so hang in there.
3/5.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews