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Overview
"Even if a magician's powers surface of their own accord, he will soon be dead if he does not gain the knowledge of how to control them."
Alone among all the novices in the Magicians' Guild, only Sonea comes from lowly beginnings. Yet she has won powerful allies—including Lord Dannyl, newly promoted to Guild Ambassador. But Dannyl must now depart for the Elyne court, leaving Sonea at the mercy of the lies and malicious rumors her enemies are busy spreading . . . until the High Lord Akkarin steps in. The price of Akkarin's support is dear, however, because Sonea, in turn, must protect his mysteries—and a secret that could lead a young novice mage deep into the darkness.
Meanwhile, Dannyl's first order to resume High Lord Akkarin's long-abandoned research into ancient magical knowledge is setting him on an extraordinary journey fraught with unanticipated peril—as he moves ever-closer to a future both wondrous . . . and terrible.
Synopsis
"Even if a magician's powers surface of their own accord, he will soon be dead if he does not gain the knowledge of how to control them."
Alone among all the novices in the Magicians' Guild, only Sonea comes from lowly beginnings. Yet she has won powerful allies—including Lord Dannyl, newly promoted to Guild Ambassador. But Dannyl must now depart for the Elyne court, leaving Sonea at the mercy of the lies and malicious rumors her enemies are busy spreading . . . until the High Lord Akkarin steps in. The price of Akkarin's support is dear, however, because Sonea, in turn, must protect his mysteries—and a secret that could lead a young novice mage deep into the darkness.
Meanwhile, Dannyl's first order to resume High Lord Akkarin's long-abandoned research into ancient magical knowledge is setting him on an extraordinary journey fraught with unanticipated peril—as he moves ever-closer to a future both wondrous . . . and terrible.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewAustralian fantasy author Trudi Canavan continues her Black Magician trilogy with the sequel to The Magicians' Guild, a novel that introduced readers to Sonea, an orphan girl with remarkable magical abilities. In The Novice, she must battle the malicious -- and potentially deadly -- machinations of the powerful magicians' guild and its evil High Lord.
After surviving a wild adventure that almost killed her, Sonea has finally been accepted as a novice into the prestigious university of the magicians' guild. But Sonea -- who grew up in the slums of the city Imardin -- is a fish out of water at the university, whose students all come from wealthy and powerful families. Even though she is easily the most gifted student, her peers ostracize her and play hurtful pranks on her. In a vast university of hundreds of students and teachers, it seems everyone is against Sonea and is waiting to see her fail.
Meanwhile, Dannyl, a guild ambassador to the distant kingdom of Elyne, is on a secret mission to find out the shadowy history of the enigmatic High Lord, who may very well be behind a series of gruesome murders in Imardin that involve black magic.
Fans of epic fantasy who have already sampled Australian authors like Sara Douglass, Cecilia Dart-Thornton, Juliet Marillier, and Ian Irvine should definitely give Canavan a try. The Novice is escapist literature at its very best. Paul Goat Allen