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Wizard at Large (Magic Kingdom of Landover, Book 3)
by Terry Brooks
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Del Rey (1989-07-17)
ISBN: 0345362276
EAN: 9780345362278
Dewy Decimal #: 813
Mass Market Paperback: 320 pages
Release Date: 1989-07-17
SKU: 9345
Condition: Good
Comments: Binding: Softcover. Condition: Good.
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Questor Thews is only a semi-competent wizard, but when High Lord Ben Holiday and his love Willow need use of his powers, he tries to comply. He tries, all right, but he doesn't have all that much faith in himself--not since he turned a terrier into an imp. Still, he'll do what he can....
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Customer Reviews
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Wizard at Large
Rating  (5)
Date: 2008-03-04
I am a huge Terry Brooks fan. This book does not disappoint. I have introduced my grandson to Terry Brooks, and he enjoyed this book as much as I did.
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Would've been better without Cameron Beierle narrating.
Rating  (2)
Date: 2007-04-26
While Brooks is not a great comedic fantasy author (see Terry Pratchett for someone who is) he is generally a good fantasy author. I keep listening to the Landover CDs hoping to get past Cameron Beierle's horrible readings and I can't.
Apparently the original audiobooks were done by "Dick Hill" and released on cassette only. These new CDs suffer greatly from issues like:
*Frequent mispronunciations of words (Foliage becomes "foilage" for instance);
*a completely phony sounding "hard boiled detective" voice for Ben Holliday (I am convinced Beierle is NOT a native english speaker as he often rolls his Rs or makes a soft "D" instead of an "R".);
*Randomly changing pronunciations of character names (the fairly simple word "paladin" is usually mispronounced "puhLADin" although in book 2 he freely changes back and forth between the two pronunciations.
*His female voices are atrocious. Willow sounds like Carol Channing imitating Marilyn Monroe's "happy birthday, mister president" performance. Willow pronounces "Ben" something like "Byeeeeehn".
Wizard at Large particularly suffers from having inappropriate pauses in the middle of passages where one would expect an editor to remove the dead space. In fact the whole series seems like nobody did any kind of production oversight or direction of the audiobooks at all.
On the plus side, Cameron does a fine job with second and third tier characters like Questor Thews, Abernathy and the G'home Gnomes.
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What was I thinking?
Rating (2)
Date: 2006-09-23
1 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
I read all of Terry Brooks books as a kid and thought I'd re-read a bunch of them for fun. Picked up most of the books at a used book store on a whim.
While I liked "Magical Kingdom For Sale", this one was just based on the dumbest premise of all. Seriously, the entire premise of this book is stupid. The King has one magical amulet that is the most important thing in the world and he gives it away by page 30. The rest of the book is just listening to the stupid antics of him trying to get it back. Blah, blah and blah. I just couldn't get past the main plot thread.
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Once again, Terry Brooks delivers and Dick Hill captures the mood.
Rating (5)
Date: 2006-09-04
Terry Brooks returns to Landover with yet another stunning tale of adventure and danger. Less than a year after nearly losing the kingdom of Landover to the duplicitous wizard Meeks, Ben Holiday once again finds himself fighting for his life. The mess begins when Questor Thews, the court wizard and half-brother to the vanquished Meeks, rushes into the garden room to announce triumphantly that he has finally found a way to change Abernathy, the court scribe, back to his human form after more than twenty years. The spell requires just one thing, a catalist that will separate the man from the dog in Abernathy, thereby allowing the transformation to take place. Unfortunately, the only item within easy reach that could possibly serve this purpose is Ben's enchanted medallion. Despite the danger posed by such an act, Ben reluctantly hands over the medallion, giving Questor the Ok to work his magic. But as we all know, Questor's magic doesn't always work the way he intends, and sometimes the results can be devastating. A sneeze on the part of Questor sends the magic spinning wildly out of control with catastrophic consequences. Not only does Abernathy fail to change back, but he's also sucked down into a strange well of light that carries him off to an unknown land...along with Ben's medallion. The mystery only deepens when, almost immediately after Abernathy vanishes, a mysterious bottle appears where the scribe once stood. Though at first nobody knows neither the origin nor the nature of the bottle, Questor remembers an event in his past that sheds a disturbing light on Abernathy's situation.
The bottle, Questor confesses, is an old relic of Meeks, the former court wizard, which the old man often gave to the son of the last king of Landover to play with. The bottle, Questor reveals, is the prison of a powerful genie-like demon who appears when summoned and obeys the command of its master. This creature, called a Darkling, draws the power for its magics from the darker side of a person's nature, anger, hatred, envy, greed, etc. The more powerful and cruel its master, the stronger the demon. Since the bottle was last in the possession of Michel Ard Rhi, the son of the last king, Questor can only deduce that Abernathy was sent to the place where the bottle was kept. Abernathy, it turns out, was sent back to Earth, to wherever Michel Ard Rhi lived. The situation only gets worse when Philip and Sot, friends of Ben's from the north, steal the bottle, believing it to be a pretty trinket. Now, Ben must not only recover his missing medallion and Abernathy, but also track down and regain possession of the bottle before it's opened.
Despite the seriousness of Abernathy's situation, he is not completely without help. After waking up to find himself scrunched into a display case, he encounters a little girl named Elizabeth, who reveals that he's in Woodenville, Washington. More specifically, he's inside the castle of Graum Wythe, which is ruled by a man named Michel Ard Rhi. Abernathy decides to tell Elizabeth the truth about him and urges her to help him escape from the castle before Michel learns of his presence. Elizabeth readily agrees, and the two of them set about forming a plan to beat the clock and get Abernathy safely away before his old enemy learns of his presence. Will Ben recover the bottle and find a way to exchange it for Abernathy? Will Elizabeth and Abernathy find a way to elude Michel before it's too late? The climactic battle at the end will answer that question quite nicely.
All in all I liked the presentation of this book. I'd read the unabridged Library of Congress version and liked it, but the Brilliance Audio abridgment was even better. Very little indeed was left out, and once again Dick Hill delivers a quality performance. My only complaint was his portrayal of the Darkling, but even that really wasn't that bad. He does manage to convey the fawning yet sinister nature of the creature quite nicely. If you haven't read this book yet and you enjoyed the first two novels in the series, pick up this book. Once again, Brooks delivers a masterpiece.
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This series continues to roll on with energy
Rating (5)
Date: 2006-03-23
1 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
The landover works are very well done, with stand out characters. Action, missteps, all done with great skill. Keep up the good work!!
If you like books like this one, might I suggest another I've recently come across. The Unsuspecting Mage by Brian S. Pratt. It's another fantasy adventure sure to please. I highly recommend it.
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