Heart of Gold, Word of Honour, Time of Trial, Moment of Truth

“Charmingly old-fashioned” is how I would describe Michael Pryor’s series The Laws of Magic, which begins with Blaze of Glory (reviewed previously) and continues with Heart of Gold, Word of Honour, Time of Trial, and the most recent, due out this summer, Moment of Truth. The concluding book will be Hour of Need… My review of Blaze of Glory called it a solid if not compelling book that piqued my interest enough to want to continue. I’m glad I did, for while the later books do have some of the same flaws as that first book, in general the series gradually improves and deepens as it goes on, while the world turns grimmer and Aubrey grows older…  they remind me a lot of YA books from the ’60s (before they were called YA) such as The Hardy Boys, Tom Swift, Nancy Drew, etc… The characters are all good, they’re all good at what they do and they show surprising skills as needed, there are a lot of convenient coincidences, and one never has a doubt that the heroes (and they are fully heroes — no antiheroes here) will prevail. There is also a sweetness and innocence to the bonds between the characters, both as friends and in romances, that hearkens back to those books… I have to say, it’s a bit refreshing and, as I said, charming. Read the rest.