Sabriel

Rating:
Summary: Simple and original
Review: I usually hate stories with teenage girls in them and at the ripe old age of 30 I tend not to like fantasy on the lighter side of things. I loved this book! I didn't know it was for young adults when I started and I still don't see why it's labelled as that. Sabriel battles undead monsters (walking corpses, huge flaming demons etc...) throughout, children are killed and sold to undead creatures, people are sacrificed and there blood is used for dark rituals - that all sounds kind of adult to me, but I'm not complaining, some of those are the reasons I liked it so much.

The writing style is very simple, without pages full of description, but at the same time it doesn't seem underdone or choppy. The world history seems to be well thought out and I love the ideas about magic and the realm of death. The only complaint I have (and it's a small one) is that most of the problems that came up weren't solved creatively but instead outside help showed up or Sabriel suddenly remembered a spell for just that situation.

Great book I'll be looking for those sequels.

Rating:
Summary: excellent
Review: This book is not just for young adults! I picked it up because the cover looked interesting. It follows Sabriel, a girl coming to age who has to learn to deal and accept her heritage and the powers that come with it. The plot is strong with enough on the edge surprises that make the book hard to put down. I highly recommend it to anyone.

Rating:
Summary: Best Book Ever!!
Review: Sabriel is an immaculate book. Garth Nix weaves a classic tale of magic and intrigue. The world of Sabriel seems so realistic, that I feel like I can just reach out and touch her.This is most definetly my favorite book, and it is truly hard for me to say that, being an immense fan of the Harry Potter series. I recomend this book to anyone who enjoys a good novel, because anyone of any age will love this delightful book.

Rating:
Summary: Best book I've ever read
Review: I love his book and Shade's Children. I read them in 3-4 days. I recommand them too all my friends they like them too. I strongly suggest this book. And all others by Garth Nix.

Rating:
Summary: Often overlooked, but way above par
Review: I have read the Harry Potter books, and eagerly await #5, and I love them. But, and some may consider this blasphemy, I like this one more. 'Sabriel' is my favorite book, and that's saying a lot. I have read it several times, and each time, I love it more. I cannot wait for 'Lireal,' the sequel, to come out in early spring of next year. It was originally expected in Cotober...I believe...but has been bumped back (thinking of Pullman, anyone?). It was also supposed to be a sequel, but has ended up as two books, the third to be called Abhorsen. I found all of this information at his website, along with four or five sample chapters of 'Lireal,' (the chapters are only on his older site) which takes place after many years after 'Sabriel,' but Sabriel and Touchstone are in it. Back to Sabriel, I really loved this book because it was so engaging. It starts strong and doen't let down. I loved Mogget, and the bells struck me as such a fabulous idea. The book deals with family, love, relationships, death, sacrifice, and, most definitely, magic and peoples understanding of it.

Rating:
Summary: Lush, completely imaginative fantasy-adventure
Review: Possibly one of the greatest fantasy adventures of our times, Garth Nix's first novel is a lush, magical, dark-witty adventure about a young woman's battle with the hideous Dead.

The story starts with a flashback in which a special necromancer named Abhorsen saves his baby daughter Sabriel from a creature called Kerrigor, in the spiritual river of death. Many years later, at an English-esque boarding school, Sabriel must take up her father's magical sword and bells and try to find out what has happened to him. To do so, she must leave her relatively high-tech home for the Old Kingdom, where magic rules and evil things are stalking her.

Along the way, she is accompanied by the guard Touchstone and the menacing/funny cat-spirit Mogget. They must try to defeat the evil Kerrigor, who wants to blast the Charter which keeps all things from descending into evil.

Sabriel is the best fantasy hero I've read about since Lord of the Rings. Too many fantasy heroines are either damsels or warrior women--Sabriel is neither. She acts and thinks precisely like a young woman in her position. Strong, intriguing, and no slack with a sword in a bad situation, she is a wonderful role model.

Touchstone is a darling, but Mogget really is unique. Is he evil? Good? Or some peculiar mix? This ancient spirit forced to live as a cat is enslaved to the Abhorsen family for the good of everyone (we get a glimpse of how dangerous he is). The world that Garth Nix dreamed up, a mixture of Tolkien and WW2 England, is unparalleled in the fantasy genre. It's populated by animated ghouls, ghastly Mordicants, the almost-human sendings, Charter ghosts, the inhabitants of the river of Death, where only Abhorsens go, and so on...

His writing style is lush and hypnotic--you can actually see the events unfolding in front of your eyes, in this wintry but inviting world.

Thankfully, Mr. Nix appears to be writing a pair of sequels--I can hardly wait. Anyone else think this should be made into a movie?

Rating:
Summary: This is a great book!
Review: This is one of the best books I've ever read! I recommend everyone to read this book! Sabriel ia a necromancer. . . a person who can travel into Death, and awaken the Dead. But she is not a normal necromancer, she is Abhorson. There is only one Abhorson at a time, and Sabriel is the current one. The Abhorson's job is to bind the Dead. Sabriel has magical bells, and a magical sword. The bells she uses to bind the Dead, and the sword, to kill the "living Dead", Dead who have traveled out of Death into the Realm of the Living. The sword can slay Hands, Shadow Hands, and maybe a weak Morchdant. But Sabriel and her friends Mogget and Touchstone have a bigger, and stronger enemy, Kerrigor. Will Sabriel be able to defeat Kerrigor? And who exactly is he? Will the Charter live on? You must read this book to find out!

Rating:
Summary: A Unique and Memorable Fantasy
Review: "Sabriel" by Garth Nix is a unique and memorable fantasy. For those of you who feel that dragons, unicorns, and bards are a bit overdone nowadays, this fantasy offers up a heroine who binds the dead with a bandolier of bells. The Geography of Death is lovingly delineated, from the prologue where Sabriel is born and dies and is rescued from the First Gate of Death by her father, to the book's final quarter where Sabriel rescues her father from the Fourth Gate of Death. Unlike Dante's Inferno, Death in this fantasy is a river, a waterfall, pools of black water, strange currents that suck the spirit from the flesh.

Sabriel herself is an English schoolgirl, recently graduated from Wyverley Academy with a "first in English, equal first in Music, third in Mathematics, seventh in Science, second in Fighting Arts and fourth in Etiquette. She had also been a runaway first in Magic.." A visitation from the Dead sends Sabriel on a quest through the magical Old Kingdom, in order to reunite her father's body with his spirit which is trapped within the Fourth Gate of Death. She has to do battle with a really nasty necromancer-Adept, and rescue a prince who is a bit of a figurehead at first but who finally develops into a memorable character in his own right. Sabriel is both helped and hindered by a very non-cuddly cat named Mogget.

"Sabriel" was first published in 1995, so I'm hoping there is a sequel by now. By all means, read this book if you love good fantasy.

Rating:
Summary: why can't "adult" fiction be this good?
Review: SABRIEL is easily one of the very best works of fiction I have read in the last 5 years. It is elegant, pure, lovely and lyric. Though towering with a sad grandeur, SABRIEL yet retains a warm and sincere intimacy, embracing the reader with Fine Company. Sabriel and Mogget are a matched set, each a powerful being contained in an innocuous vessel; Abhorsen, seemingly dark and stern - even menacing - but hiding a great and secret mirth for those with eyes to see. There are no unimportant characters cluttering this story; each has a distinct and readable story - even if it isn't written down; even the most minor characters are wonderfully alive and real. SABRIEL has a refreshing lack of two-dimensional characters. There is also in this book an unshakeable hope - not a pollyanna sort of hope, but a hope that good will triumph over evil at any cost. There is beauty as well: the beautiful, real love which is a laying down of life; the beauty of life freely given up. There is death in this book - the death of body, death by selflessness, and death by selfishness - death of the soul (and a clear delineation twixt the two). I wish more of the "adult" stories I read had the depth of insight, the power to move me as deeply as SABRIEL. There is nothing of the vulgar or trite or cheap or mean in this book. This is FAR more adult fiction (in the best sense) than most of my "adult" reading. To be too "adult" to read and appreciate a book of this caliber is to be dead inside. If you want your children to read something that will make them grow spiritually and mentally, I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

Rating:
Summary: Desparatley Seeking Sequel
Review: With the majority of young adult fantasy books these days including bland characters, unremarkable settings, and suspiciously similar and predictable plots, it is a truly refreshing experience to read a book as un-cliched and original as Garth Nix's Sabriel. The excellent imagination of his writing is revealed at the very beginning of the book, as you are thrown into a strange and intriguing world with words and rituals that cannot be understood until revealed later in the book. The true eloquence of his writing comes forth as you discover this new world and all of its meanings along with Sabriel when she travels North to find her father. This book has all the marks of a true masterpiece. The main character, Sabriel, is incredibly human and age appropriate, her thoughts and feelings ringing true through the subtle writing throughout the book. I am most impressed, however, by the character Mogget, a most intriguing and innovative character, with a past impossible to guess. The book is filled with exciting and refreshingly new ideas, while the plot holds up all the way through and leaves you wanting more. Yes, the only thing that this book is lacking is a sequel, which I am still not so patiently awaiting.