Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on 28 September 1330. Nearly seven hundred years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life. The records show that he died in 1418. But his tomb is empty and Nicholas Flamel lives.
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GoodReads Summary:
Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on 28 September 1330. Nearly seven hundred years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life. The records show that he died in 1418. But his tomb is empty and Nicholas Flamel lives.
The secret of eternal life is hidden within the book he protects – the Book of Abraham the Mage. It’s the most powerful book that has ever existed. In the wrong hands, there it will destroy the world. And that’s exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he steals it. Humankind won’t know what’s happening until it’s too late. And if the prophecy is right, side effects Sophie and Josh Newman are the only ones with the power to save the world as we know it. Sometimes legends are true. And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves in the middle of the greatest legend of all time.
My Review:
I gotta say thanks to my follower/friend Michelle for pushing me to read this. It took me ages, Michelle, but I finally did it!
And I really enjoyed this book. I would say, I think its more middle grade than young adult, but maybe the books get a little bit more mature as the series goes along? The characters are definitely teenagers but its written toward a young YA audience, I think. I don’t think this is a bad thing at all, its actually kind of refreshing to read something a little different.
I really loved that this was a twin story. It felt really fun and different because the main characters were a pair of twins, a brother and a sister, and it was adventurous one. As much as I love the love stories (and I LOVE my love stories), sometimes its nice to have a break and I love sibling stories a lot. I think there a lot of YA books that forget about the sibling bond, or just ignore it, and I don’t like that. I love that this is the center of the story of this novel. It makes it fun to read to see Sophie and Josh get ripped from their normal world and into the magical world of Nicholas Flamel.
The adventure is really what got me attached to these books. While the book started off kind of slow to me, the adventure gets me really caught up, especially once you really start realizing Sophie and Josh’s part in the whole story. I would say about a third in, there was a particular part where they meet someone new, someone absolutely extraordinary and that’s really when I became attached the book and I couldn’t stop reading. This story is a mystery and a fantasy and its beautiful. It was an adventure and it was seriously fun to read an adventure story again. Even though it was a VERY different story from Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, it had that adventure feel to it and I love it. I kind of missed that.
I also love the mythology of it. I love that there’s history and various different cultures’ mythologies weaved into the story. It lends some intricacy into the story and it really makes it authentic. Michael Scott is obviously borrowing on so many stories and blending them into his own, and its what makes it so good. He is a great world builder and I really admire an author who can build worlds so well, and use real life myths and history to strengthen it.
Bottom line, read the book. Read the series. I have a stack a mile high of to read books but I definitely want to continue reading the series. I feel that this book was just the build up to an intense series and I’m excited for it. I gotta get my hands on the other books and soon!
Rating:
4 out of 5 Stars
All of his books are mythology based. So many different forms of mythology from Celtic to Egyptian to American, it gets a lot of depth to his stories and makes the so real. The fact that only 2 characters were made up in this series is amazing. Only Josh and Sophie did not exist, everyone else has a traceable timeline in history. That just amazes me. Might be why I love them so much.
I almost gave you this book for Christmas! I should have!
I started this book but couldn’t get that into it. I think it is definitely a middle grade. I love the idea of this series because of the history and mythology, but I wanted it to be more YAish.