Rating: 
Summary: Got even better with the second read.
Review: I love all DWJ books, and this one was just as good. In fact, I liked it even more the second time I read it, and the third...and I'll probably re-read it again after a while. The thing about this book (and others by the same author) is the more times you read it, the more you get from it. Interesting little details pop out at you, making you revel in the author's cleverness. All of the characters have great, unique personalities that make you feel as if you could recognize them if they came walking down the street towards you--even the bad guys! And of course, there are the funny bits, the haunting bits, the clever bits and so on. Every part of the book is worth reading. And worth owning. So that you can re-read it a thousand times, like me.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't get it. If you already own it hide it.
Review: I saw the cover of this book and read the back and instantly bought it. I thought it would be the perfect book for me. It wasn't. It was written well and I really liked it at first but then I couldn't wait until I finished it and could start another book. In the begining of the book the two sibling characters are all new to this whole world of mages and centaurs. Then after a while they began to help the journoir mage help find a missing king in another world.
At first it seemed good. But then towards the end you find out that . . . (Sorry if I gave anything away). Now that would've been alright if it were talking about the kids in the second person. But they were all in the first person. . . . And the back of the book is entirely misleading. It says that . . . Don't read this book. If you need some good books to read, don't read this. E-mail me and I'll tell you some good book ideas. Read Artemis Fowl or Pendragon or His Dark Materials Trilogy or the Deptford Mice Trilogy or anything.... thank you for your patience.
Rating:
Summary: Light Reading
Review: I was in England when I saw this book. I normally like Diana Wynne Jones books, so i picked this one up. I read the back, and knew I wanted it, so i bought it and spent the next few hours reading it. It was pretty good! I'd recomend this book for light reading. It is full of wit and humor and is overall very enjoyable. It was fast going, and even my younger brother liked it. I'm giving this book 5 stars for light reading, but if you are looking for something intellectual or something that will require any thinking at all, i do not recomend this book, but i think that in all of the other circomstanses this book is good. By the way, the english paperback cover is better.
Rating:
Summary: Super, smashing, great!
Review: I wasn't sure what to expect when I heard that Diana Wynne Jones had started writing books for adults. But Deep Secret seems no different from her children's books - not that that's a bad thing! Once again she's written a truly terrific book. I couldn't put it down and it had me laughing out loud. The characters are wonderful and there's a lovely love story running through it. I now have two ambitions in life - to be a Magid and to meet a centaur. Read Deep Secret and you will too!
Rating:
Summary: One of our best author's best books!
Review: I would say this is the first time DWJ has written an adult book which is fully as good as her best juvenile books - which I mean as a very high compliment indeed. The many complications are wonderfully woven together and beautifully resolved, while still keeping to the frantic pace of her best plotting. There is a theme of deep secrets coming to light (life), which gives the plot more-than-causal coherency.
Rating:
Summary: Another treasure from DWJ
Review: If you liked The Merlin Conspiracy, you'll like this! In fact, if you haven't read The Merlin Conspiracy yet but it's on your list, I highly recommend you tear through this first. Nick Mallory is introduced in this book, which takes place a year prior to The Merlin Conspiracy.
But although Nick plays a key role, this book is (mostly) about Rupert Venables. Rupert is a magid, which is a wizard that travels through the universe making sure everything goes as its supposed to on orders from "Them Up There". Rupert is a magid to parts of Earth as well as the Korfyros Empire.
Now don't get thrown in the beginning when quite a few people die. I should add not to get thrown later on in Chapter 16 when more people do too.
One of the people who die is Stan, Rupert's mentor, who "stays behind" awhile longer in order to advise Rupert on sponsering a new magid.
Finding a new magid, and the sudden assinasion of the Korfyros emporer, who's heir is nearly impossible to find, although it's something he's been asked to do, is hard enough on anyone. But in order to decide who he's going to sponser as a magid, he must have his 5 canidates all meet at a hotel in which a Fantasy/Sci-Fi convention is occuring. And someone is trying to kill off the heirs when they ARE found. PLUS most of his canidates are either completely insane or completely annoying. And he despises the fifth one, Maree Mallory. Or does he?
We also hear a bit from Maree. Nick finishes the book up, but mostly we see the story from Rupert's point of view.
This is a wonderful book and leaves you wishing there was more as you turn the last page.
Rating:
Summary: Just Plain Fun!
Review: Like most other books by Diana Wynne Jones you quickly find yourself understanding the complex world of the Magids. Every character in this book has their own little angle and it is fun to see how they all interact and it all comes together. Nothing is really wasted plotwise although you don't realize this fully until the end. Really this book is just plain lot's of fun to read!
Rating:
Summary: Gets a read every year
Review: My previous experience of Diana Wynne Jones was as a twelve year old reading the Chrestomanci novels. I never knew there was such a wealth of Jone's novels out there. Having loved and lost (my mother gave it away) Fire and Hemlock. I discovered Deep Secret which has the same flavour of myth and mystery. The characters: Magids, potential Magids, Emperors, centaurs are so much more flawed, real and gritty in this book. It was a pleasure to giggle as they reluctantly undergo their transformation into less selfish, self-centred individuals. Just read it! I gave it to my husband who is a die hard Feist, Eddings, Hobb fan and he loved it.
Rating:
Summary: Why oh why isn't Wynne Jones as famous as JK Rowling?
Review: Or, for that matter, Neil Gaiman, Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, etc. ad infinitum? She is certainly in their league, having already written four of the best YA books ever: Hexwood, Howl's Moving Castle, Castle in the Air, and Fire and Hemlock. She's a damn genius, wildly clever and funny, and a deep, unsentimental romantic to boot. And Deep Secret is one of her best: a hilarious send-up of science fiction cons and a wonderful tale of Magids who "tend" worlds throughout the universe. Rupert Venables, her male protagonist, is everything a slavering Anglophile could ever want: diffident, self-conscious, witty, by turns outraged and cowed -- he's wonderful. And her female protagonists aren't cookie-cutter hotties, either. Like the resourceful but dumpy Ann in Hexwood, DS's heroine Maree is insufferable, untidy, shrewd, brave and totally endearing. DWJ's novels are like a tonic -- they come out of left field, are totally delightful and they make you feel, for at least a day or so, that there is some order in the universe.
Rating:
Summary: Why oh why isn't Wynne Jones as famous as JK Rowling?
Review: Or, for that matter, Neil Gaiman, Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, etc. ad infinitum? She is certainly in their league, having already written four of the best YA books ever: Hexwood, Howl's Moving Castle, Castle in the Air, and Fire and Hemlock. She's a damn genius, wildly clever and funny, and a deep, unsentimental romantic to boot. And Deep Secret is one of her best: a hilarious send-up of science fiction cons and a wonderful tale of Magids who "tend" worlds throughout the universe. Rupert Venables, her male protagonist, is everything a slavering Anglophile could ever want: diffident, self-conscious, witty, by turns outraged and cowed -- he's wonderful. And her female protagonists aren't cookie-cutter hotties, either. Like the resourceful but dumpy Ann in Hexwood, DS's heroine Maree is insufferable, untidy, shrewd, brave and totally endearing. DWJ's novels are like a tonic -- they come out of left field, are totally delightful and they make you feel, for at least a day or so, that there is some order in the universe.
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