amelianotthepilot's Reviews (835)

A cross between Harry Potter and Percy Jackson but not as good as either. Nonetheless, it was still a good story filled with exciting adventures between a group of friends. A boy named Callum Hunt goes through a test to be accepted into the magic school, Magesterium, except he aims to fail as directed by his father. He gets into Magesterium and is taught by the best teacher accompanied by the top kids even though he failed his test. His two friends Aaron and Tamara become his first and best friends and they go through everything together. The school starts off with a Percy Jackson type dinner with food that tastes like/looks like your favorite meal and continues on with crazy magic classes and hallways that you could get lost in like in Harry Potter. Even when Aaron becomes the 'Harry Potter' of the group by being a Makar, a chaos magician, and Tamar becomes somewhat of a 'Hermione' the story stays interesting. Callum becomes the 'Voldemort' of the story but will he become evil? The world may never know because this story ends in somewhat of a cliff hanger with Callum, Tamara, and Aaron ascending to the next level of school. With Aaron as the Makar destined to destroy Callum, and Callum/Constantine's magic no longer able to be binded, what will happen in their next year at school?!

An interesting aspect to this story is that Callum is crippled since birth. I thought it was great to have such a different protagonist. It's not every day you have a 'hero' who can't run and do 'hero like things'. I think that aspect is great.
I was extremely annoyed with the name choice due to the fact that the nickname for Callum was Cal except spelt Call which to me is a verb. This left me constantly confused whether they were calling someone if it was the character Call.
I also thought some of the subject matter would be a bit dark and gruesome for elementary school-middle school kids. I mean the book starts with a mass murder, a twisted up and injured little baby, and a mom carving her last words into the wall-"KILL THE CHILD". There are also some battle sequences that I thought would be intense for younger kids. Man I guess kids are different these days, things have changed.

It was a good story but sadly should be left to the kids and is not good enough to be read at all ages.

All that was truly needed in this book is the last chapter. The rest of it is a boring "lawyer book" filled with random stories from and island full of racist people and court case.
I find that when the word penis is written in a novel the novel looses its repute and no longer has the possibility of becoming "classical literature". Especially when it says penis every 50 pages. I also find that the knowledge of every person on the island's sex life is unnecessary and frankly really weird.

Ranked next to 50 Shades of Grey I would say this book gets 3.5, maybe 4, stars because it lacked the kinky qualities of 50 shades.

All around sucky book that I do not recommend having to read for school. 0/10 would not recommend.

A bit confusing to follow but an amazing read!
Its not just about a teenage girl falling in love like every other dystopian YA book, its about war and the effects it has on people.
We are studying WWII in school right now and this book seemed to tie into it in so many ways and this book was obviously written as at least partial nod to all those soldiers.
It's just so good.
So good I don't even know what else to say.
So good.