This delightful romp is set in an alternate Regency England, where a royal college of wizards flourishes and the government includes a minister of wizardry. Kim, a girl raised to thievery on the London streets and now disguised as a boy, teams up with Mairelon the Magician after she is hired to search his caravan. Mairelon turns out not to be the simple marketplace phony Kim first thinks him, but Richard Merrill, a member of the gentry and a true magician. He is looking for a group of silver implements, necessary for a truth spell, that he had been accused of stealing from the royal college of wizards years before. He has found one piece and is given a lead to another, supposedly secreted at a country estate. Kim and Merrill, along with his grumbling servant Hunch, travel down to Essex, encountering the inept Sons of the New Dawn, breaking into a house party where others beat them to their prize, discovering a variety of forgeries and getting mixed up in a murder and the elopement of an heiress. Kim finds she has a true talent for wizardry and escapes the fate awaiting a young girl in the streets of this alternate early-19th-century London. Wrede's ( Snow White and Rose Red ) confection will charm readers of both Regency romances and fantasies. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
YA-- This historical fantasy borrows many of the conventions of the historical romance to create a frothy tale that should appeal to a broader audience than would a straightforward fantasy, romance, or historical novel. Kim is surviving the streets of some London in never-never land by disguising herself as a boy and working at the least objectionable and illegal tasks offered to her. She knows that her age is bringing her masquerade to an end, so when fortune throws the mysterious, but apparently honorable, Mairelon in her path with the offer of a job and a destination, she takes the opportunity. From this point, the plot plunges headlong into a convoluted story involving magic, disguised noblemen, sacred vessels, and a put all the subjects in the same room and we'll solve this mystery'' conclusion. Trying to stay one guess ahead of Kim and one behind the dashing Mairelon will keep the pages turning. Although Kim is a somewhat vague conception, Mairelon qualifies as a fully realized romantic hero. The novel ends with Kim entering wizard training and her realization that now,anything might happen. Anything at all.'' Savvy librarians will interpret this as the beginning of a series with crowd-pleasing potential. --Cathy Chauvette, Fairfax County Public Library, VA Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Description:
From Publishers Weekly
This delightful romp is set in an alternate Regency England, where a royal college of wizards flourishes and the government includes a minister of wizardry. Kim, a girl raised to thievery on the London streets and now disguised as a boy, teams up with Mairelon the Magician after she is hired to search his caravan. Mairelon turns out not to be the simple marketplace phony Kim first thinks him, but Richard Merrill, a member of the gentry and a true magician. He is looking for a group of silver implements, necessary for a truth spell, that he had been accused of stealing from the royal college of wizards years before. He has found one piece and is given a lead to another, supposedly secreted at a country estate. Kim and Merrill, along with his grumbling servant Hunch, travel down to Essex, encountering the inept Sons of the New Dawn, breaking into a house party where others beat them to their prize, discovering a variety of forgeries and getting mixed up in a murder and the elopement of an heiress. Kim finds she has a true talent for wizardry and escapes the fate awaiting a young girl in the streets of this alternate early-19th-century London. Wrede's ( Snow White and Rose Red ) confection will charm readers of both Regency romances and fantasies.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
YA-- This historical fantasy borrows many of the conventions of the historical romance to create a frothy tale that should appeal to a broader audience than would a straightforward fantasy, romance, or historical novel. Kim is surviving the streets of some London in never-never land by disguising herself as a boy and working at the least objectionable and illegal tasks offered to her. She knows that her age is bringing her masquerade to an end, so when fortune throws the mysterious, but apparently honorable, Mairelon in her path with the offer of a job and a destination, she takes the opportunity. From this point, the plot plunges headlong into a convoluted story involving magic, disguised noblemen, sacred vessels, and a
put all the subjects in the same room and we'll solve this mystery'' conclusion. Trying to stay one guess ahead of Kim and one behind the dashing Mairelon will keep the pages turning. Although Kim is a somewhat vague conception, Mairelon qualifies as a fully realized romantic hero. The novel ends with Kim entering wizard training and her realization that now,anything might happen. Anything at all.'' Savvy librarians will interpret this as the beginning of a series with crowd-pleasing potential. --Cathy Chauvette, Fairfax County Public Library, VACopyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.