The Iron Trial follows a young boy called Callum Hunt who begins his training as a mage in a scary but cool magic school called The Magisterium. Callum has been warned about the horrors of the school his entire life by his father, who has shunned the mages since the death of his wife and Callum’s mother but Callum will soon discover things his father never told him, and find friends for the first time in his life.

I’ve wanted to read this forever and I’m so glad I finally picked it up after getting the urge to read a middle grade book as I really enjoyed this book. Naturally, this series has gotten a lot of comparisons to Harry Potter and there’s definitely a lot of things that are similar but I feel like this would happen in any story about a kid going to magic school. However I do think because of the in-depth knowledge and look at Hogwarts and magic lessons JK Rowling gave us in Harry Potter, The Iron Trial fell short for me. I’m the type of reader that when reading about magic, I want to know everything. I want to know what books they’re reading to help study, what they’re covering in all their lessons, what makes up the spells they’re using and I don’t think we got that with this book and I missed it. I wonder if maybe Black and Clare just haven’t got there with how this magic system works (it’s like they have the bones but not the meat yet) but I would just like more, more, more.

I did really enjoy Callum’s tentative friendship with Aaron and Tamara as well as the blossoming flirtatiousness with Celia (I like that the romance seemed more between Celia and Callum for now rather than Callum and Tamara cause yawn, predictable). I also liked how he wasn’t totally against being friends with Jasper eventually. I also, obviously, loved the introduction of Havoc though I don’t understand how they were able to keep him hidden for so long.

The plot was a little bit predictable, I saw a lot of reveals coming a mile off but again, this is probably because this is a middle-grade novel. Weirdly, there are a few things in this novel that reminded me of books I’ve read before such as a Makar needing a human counterweight for more power and control and

Callum’s soul being replaced by another as a baby.

And BOTH of these things I’ve seen in Sarah Rees Brennan’s books who happens to be a close friend of Clare’s. Curious and curioser.

But overall this was a fun read and just what I wanted. I’m definitely going to read on and i can’t wait to see what happens next.