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supitsgdo · 1 year

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Book review: The Secrets of The Immortal Nicholas Flamel saga by Michael Scott

Rating:

The Alchemyst - 3⭐️

The Magician - 3⭐️

The Enchantress - 3⭐️

The Warlock - 2,5⭐️

The Necromancer - 2,5⭐️

The Sorceress - 3,5⭐️

This saga had long been forgotten in the bottom of my TBR list when I stopped reading for a few years because of college. I bought this when I was younger, I remember that I was really happy and looking forward to reading stories about magicians, and also the covers looked so cool back then (and still do). I bought the books in Portuguese and decided to wait for all of them to come out (plot twist, they didn’t translate the last book so now my collection is ruined) but my sister bought them in English and read them a few years ago, and I remember that she liked them.

However, upon reading them now, ~15years later (wow I’m old), I had the feeling that the story wasn’t that well planned and the writing was lacking in quality in many scenes. Some things didn’t make sense, e.g., Sophie had all the memories and she could get access to everything, and then all of a sudden, she couldn’t, just because it suited the plot.

The pace of the story was too fast, it didn’t let the tension or suspense brew, there was no real calculated build up, things just happened. The Necromancer and The Warlock were the books I noticed that were more lacking in this department. I think they wanted to add more mythologies and characters, but as we know, more isn’t always better. Only the final book, the end atleast, was the one who saved this saga (even though the first two were actually good). I was even emotional in the end. But still, there were some things left unexplained, or rather poorly explained. It’s like the author wanted to tie up the loose ends but failed at it.

About the characters: the best character development award goes to… Dr. John Dee. The character that I least expected. Simply put, his development was well done.

The best bromance award goes to Machiavelli and Billy the Kid, I really loved the interaction between these two and how they made each other grow.

About the main characters: Nicholas and Perenell… I didn’t like them, their attitudes or personality. (I also like the fact that the others characters didn’t like them either, for the same reasons as mine). Mostly, I wanted them dead. And if you think about it, overall, they were 80% unnecessary for the plot. Also the title of the series being “The Secrets of Nicholas Flamel” is so inaccurate.

About the twins, Sophie and Josh, Josh was my favourite character (in my top 4). He questioned everything and didn’t trust him immediately, unlike his sister. He followed his heart. And I was glad when his sister opened her eyes and followed his brother.

All in all, I just wished the story had had time to ferment into a good wine.

#The Alchemyst #The Magician #the enchantress #the warlock #the sorceress #the necromancer #Michael Scott #The Secrets of The Immortal Nicholas Flamel #book recommendations #book review #goodreads #reading challenge #2023

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bookswithsav · 1 year

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The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel: The Alchemyst

Book Information

Title : The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel: The Alchemyst

Author : Michael Scott

Series : The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel (Book One)

Rating

Was the story engaging?

The story that was being told throughout The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel: The Alchemyst was incredibly engaging. As the first book in the series, The Alchemyst has the heavy responsibility of setting up a new world for the audience: introducing characters, lore, and dangers. This often has the potential to lead to a first book that can seemingly drag on until the true overarching story is revealed. The Alchemyst, however, does not have this issue and is immediately engaging and quick-paced within the first couple of chapters.

Rating: 5/5

Were the characters enjoyable/developed well?

The characters that we as the audience meet throughout The Alchemyst are both enjoyable and well-developed through their characterizations. Some of the characters that are introduced are simply to help move the plot along, however, these characters are introduced and built upon well, enhancing the interactions that recurring characters experience. The characters that are recurring each serve their own purpose to the plot magnificently, maintaining their initial characterization while they continue to grow and experience new situations. There are a couple of characters that are quite old in age, such as Nicholas Flamel (I’m not counting this as a spoiler as it is within the title), and while their characterization is developed well, there is an air of mystery about them due to their age and knowledge that helps to solidify the world of the story. Additionally, many of the characters are an absolute delight to read, as each character has their own complete unique characterization that lends to wonderfully unique interactions and motives.

Rating: 5/5

Was the plot developed well?

The plot throughout The Alchemyst was not only developed well, but easy to justify and follow. There are a lot of situations that the characters have to experience throughout the story being told in The Alchemyst, leading to a story that is told at a very quick-pace. The odds are continuously changing for our characters - both on the good side and bad - leading to a constant need to adjust. These changes can lead to a feeling of unreasonable chaos, but that is simply not the case for The Alchemyst. With each change in situation, the reasoning as to why the change happened is easily justifiable, allowing the plot to continue to build at a steady pace right from the beginning. While I cannot begin to claim that there is no chaos present throughout the story, this chaos is an important element within the story, as our characters are not only placed into an entirely new view of the world, but also in an immensely dangerous situation. The chaos that the audience does feel is needed as an addition to the story being told, allowing them to connect further to the characters that are relaying the story itself. Additionally, the role that The Alchemyst plays within The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel series has to be considered. As the first book, not only does The Alchemyst have its own individual story to tell, but it also has the responsibility of creating the overarching story, setting up the dangers and risks that are to motivate the audience to continue reading. This building of the overarching plot within the series was started wonderfully within The Alchemyst, with the suspense continuing to build until the very end and creating an easy push-off into not only the next book, but to the overall story.

Rating: 5/5

Was the audience kept in mind?

While I would like to say that the audience was completely kept in mind, I cannot say 100% that this is the case. Throughout The Alchemyst, many mythical beings, places, and concepts are introduced and intertwined into the world we know. Now, what’s so neat about this weaving of worlds is that many legends and myths are brought into the story regardless of their origin - mythology from Ancient Egypt interacts with Irish folklore, Norse mythology becomes involved along the way with English legends. And within the context of the story, the involvement of these creatures and places from myths and legends makes complete sense, but can become quite scattered. With the frequent involvement of multiple different mythological characters across multiple mythological worlds, The Alchemyst has the potential to confuse the audience regarding the origin of these characters and their motives. These questions within the book are usually narrowed down to a simple explanation that does make sense within the context of the story, but the constant branching between different cultures and explanations does have to be considered when evaluating how the audience may perceive these involvements. Other than that, however, I believe that the audience was kept in mind wonderfully, being caught up on (most of) the potentially new concepts being introduced to them, as well as the plot and character reasonings being easy to follow/justify as the story continues.

Rating: 4/5

Would I recommend the book?

I would definitely recommend The Alchemyst. I personally had a blast reading The Alchemyst, as each character that we met had an amazingly unique characterization which helped to further enhance the already intriguing story more. It’s a great read for those interested in fantasy, and even a greater read for those who love the intertwining of fantasy worlds and real-worlds. While I, admittedly, cannot say how popular The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel series actually is, I would say that, based on the first book, it should undeniably have a place within the world of middle school classics.

Rating: 5/5

Overall Rating: 4.8/5

Review

Warning: Spoilers!

As a fan of books based on mythology and legend, I have to say that I really enjoyed The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel: The Alchemyst. The way in which mythology was connected with the modern world as we know it was executed splendidly, creating a fun and different look upon what we know. What was really neat about The Alchemyst is that it pulled in mythology and legends from a variety of different civilizations and wrapped them together into the story, creating this world-wide connection between the events happening in the story and the events of the past. Even though this is an element that I personally love about the book, I have to admit that it is not executed in the smoothest way. Different myths from different groups are quickly thrown into the story, and while this does make sense within the context of the story, there are times where it feels chaotic and messy.

The Elder Race within this series is a race of beings that existed and ruled Earth far before humans, or the race of humani, were created. Many of the gods and beings that we see from ancient myths and legends are part of the Elder Race, with many being of the original Elder Race. Some of the classical monsters that we see in literature, such as Dracula and wereclans (such as werewolfs), are also from the Elder Race, though they are considered Next Generation. All beings from the Elder Race possess some kind of otherworldly power compared to humans, which explains why they are relatively immortal and are known throughout civilizations as gods or supernatural beings. The inclusion of this detail becomes incredibly important when considering how the Elder Race has shaped history, as well as their inclusion within the story, but there is an issue with disorientation. A lot of different names are mentioned throughout The Alchemyst, some ranging from ancient gods to well-known characters of literature, and if you don’t have the prior knowledge of these names, they can be quite a bit. The history of these characters does seem to influence their strength regarding magical power within The Alchemyst, causing their origin and history to become a detail that does add to their characterization - though small. The mixtures of these different worldly myths and legends, along with how quickly they are mentioned, can become disorienting. Besides this though, I believe that the use of this combination of mythology and legends creates this absolutely beautiful connection of the world throughout The Alchemyst, creating an entirely new world within the one we already know.

While reading The Alchemyst, I found that I absolutely loved the characters that were introduced - even the evil ones. Each character is so wonderfully unique in their thoughts, interactions, and motives that they are brilliantly different from one another. There is not one interaction throughout The Alchemyst that seemed stale. Sophie and Josh both act like siblings that are moderately distant from their parents, causing them to rely on each other for many things. At the same time, Sophie and Josh are both unique in the way they approach the world, allowing that feeling of siblings to not only remain present, but to be truthfully accurate. They can be seen making fun of each other throughout The Alchemyst, but they can also be seen deeply caring for each other’s safety. Scathach holds the sense of responsibility an immortal warrior should hold after a lifetime of fighting, but she also has this wonderful sense of humor and ease about her that creates an extremely lovable character for both the audience and the twins, as it can be seen throughout The Alchemyst that they typically rely on her for guidance. Those of the Elder Race that were introduced within The Alchemyst also were unique, with their own strengths and fears becoming present throughout their interactions and movements in war.

Nicholas Flamel is a character that has to be considered fully. Nicholas is based on a real person in history (as is Dr. John Dee), and this has to be taken into account. While many of the other characters within The Alchemyst are from mythology, there is documentation of Nicholas throughout Paris, France, leading his characterization to become trickier. The documentation of Nicholas Flamel’s time in history is elusive at best, with many questions surrounding his motives and existence in the past as well as in the present. Because of what we know about the real Nicholas Flamel, whom the character in The Alchemyst is based on, there has to be a certain amount of mystery surrounding the Nicholas that we get to know throughout the story. I believe that this is done wonderfully, with a constant air of mystery surrounding Nicholas. Scathah, Dr. Dee, and Hekate warn the either Sophie or Josh about Nicholas, stating that they either cannot afford to fully trust him or that he never tells the whole truth. Even when the story is told through his point of view, the experience is brief, allowing that air of mystery to remain. Nicholas Flamel’s characterization throughout The Alchemyst does a wonderful job at providing us a character to both trust and be weary of while maintaining the elusiveness of the person he is based on.

I mentioned that the events that happen throughout The Alchemyst are typically chaotic, but I believe that this works perfectly with the story being told. Both Sophie and Josh have been thrown into a situation and new view of the world that defies what they have grown to know (especially with archeologists as parents), and they have to quickly and consistently work to stay alive with their new surroundings. Even when the story is being told through Nicholas, Perenelle, or Dr. John Dee, they are in a situation that vastly differs from what they have experienced before. Truthfully, for all characters, this situation is more perilous than anything they have experienced before, and the chaos of the events happening throughout The Alchemyst do aid in relaying this danger.

I do have to mention that there was a single interaction within The Alchemyst that seemed disingenuine to me at first glance, but made much more sense upon further consideration. Since Sophie’s powers had been awakened, we see that Josh is hesitant of his meaning to her and his role within the world they are now involved in. Dr. John Dee leans heavily on this towards the end of the book, attempting to get Josh to join his cause and abandoned Nicholas, Scathach, and Sophie. When the group is traveling through the leygate, it’s a very quick and very simple response to Josh’s hesitancy that allows him to yet again feel wanted within his sister’s life, and therefore ruins Dr. Dee’s plan. When I first read this interaction, I felt as though it was anticlimactic, however, upon further consideration, it’s perfect. Sophie and Josh have been together since birth (cause, you know, twins), and have been through a lot within their ‘normal humani’ lives together. They were close before the events of The Alchemyst, and although these events have caused differences between them, they still love and trust each other the same - possibly even more - than before. Josh’s quick reaction to Sophie’s coming back to get him makes sense when this is considered; he didn’t need powers, he just needed to know that his sister still cared for him the same way he still cared for her.

The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel: The Alchemyst has done a wonderful job at setting up an entire world congruent and yet different from our own while also creating realistically unique characters. The overarching story that is started within The Alchemyst is incredibly intriguing, leading the audience to want more as they sit at the edge of their seats, wondering who to trust and who to distrust, as well as developing the desire for safety for Sophie and Josh. The Alchemyst is not only a wonderful start to a series, but an incredible book when considered alone.

#book review #book rating #the secrets of the immortal nicholas flamel #the alchemyst #bookblr

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