V.'s Reviews > The Source of Magic

I liked this series as a child and having read the first one recently, and found it not too bad, I wanted to read the second one to see if he developed as a writer and if he managed to improve on the problems I had with the first one.

Sadly this one is a little worse than the first. It sticks to the same episodic template and jumps around all over the place, a book of ideas more than a strong narrative. I can see why I would have liked it as a child, but in terms of story it tended to be full of convenient and unlikely outcomes.

Feels like the success of the first book gave the author a formula to work to and while there’s nothing wrong with each individual part it doesn’t really add up to much.