Wizard's Hall

Rating:
Summary: Charming wizardly tale
Review: Before Harry Potter was even a blip on the screen, fantasy master Jane Yolen penned a brief, sparkling story about a quiet young boy with untapped magical powers. The delicate writing, interesting magic and likable hero serve to elevate this far above the Harry Potter series.

Henry is a shy, quiet boy who (like most kids) has various brief ambitions as to what he wants to be when he grows up. When he mentions wizardry to his mother, she sends him off to Wizards' Hall to learn magic. Things don't start off smoothly -- Henry is renamed Thornmallow (prickly on the outside and squishy inside), and he messes up even basic spells. Despite his failures, he tries hard.

But all is not well at Wizards' Hall. One night Thornmallow and his pals overhear a cold voice talking about taking over the Hall. Thornmallow is the one-hundred-and-thirteenth student needed to defeat the evil wizard Nettle and his quilted Beast... except that they don't really know how to stop Nettle. To save his friends, Thornmallow will have to call on magic he never knew he had.

Despite all the hype around the Harry Potter series, "Wizard's Hall" comes off as the superior story. "Wizard's Hall" has a kind of magical intimacy and subtle magic to the story, without any slam-bang effects. No sparkles, no fireworks. Instead, everything about the Hall seems to have a bit of magic in it -- as does the writing.

Yolen's writing shimmers the moment she introduces us to the Hall. Her descriptions of things talking pictures, star-studded ceilings, soups with lizards swimming in them, and a small avalanche of snow and roses are astonishing, especially since she rarely goes into too much detail. Even the magic of this book is beautiful and subtle, based on singing and chanting. Reversely, there's the horrific Quilted Beast, which seems to be a perfect example of unnaturality.

Thornmallow is a likable little guy, quiet and definitely suffering from a confidence problem. It's hard not to feel for him as he struggles with his magic, and suffers the consequences of battling with Nettle. His friends and mentors are a quirky bunch, and Nettle's aura of evil is pronounced without being over-the-top.

Beautifully written and exquisitely plotted, "Wizard's Hall" far outstrips the Harry Potter series. It's sweet, deceptively simple and shimmers with Yolen's unique writing. A must-have for fantasy fans.

Rating:
Summary: An Inconsequential Book
Review: It's an unremarkable but readable tale of a student wizard's first days at school. There are other wizard in training books out there (you may have even read one in a popular series, ahem) but the best is still A Wizard of Earthsea--buy that first, then return for this book if you must. It's not awful, it's mostly harmless, but it isn't her best work.

Note: 3 stars, for me, is a pretty good review, 4 is for extremely distinguished works, and 5 only for those I consider classics. Most of what is published is, unfortunately, a 2 or less.

Rating:
Summary: Promising, but flawed
Review: Jane Yolen is a talented writer. (Read the Pit Dragon Trilogy if you don't believe me.) She is at her best when writing about magical things. That means that Wizard's Hall is - a promising, but flawed book. For one thing, it is too short. There is very little that is expanded on. I would have liked to have heard more about Thornmallow's adjustment to school, his classes, his school friends, his - well, anything. It seems like she just was assigned to write a book with a specific number of pages and came up with a menacing wizard and beast to fill up the pages instead of more "ordinary" things. This isn't bad, it just gives the book a flat aura. The characters are strictly two-dimensional, with the exception of Thornmallow.

Now, what makes this book redeemable is the small details, such as the soup that tastes brown, and the beast itself. These show hints of Yolen's usual talent. Unfortunately, they are just that, hints. I recommend this book to fantasy fans, but try to get it used, it's not worth the whole price.

Rating:
Summary: An A+ book...
Review: This book was first introduced to me in my 6th grade class. We were assigned to read this book and the first installment of Harry Potter. While everybody started to read the Harry Potter book because there was a big hype around it, I chose to start with Wizard's Hall because it was shorter. When I read it I couldn't compare it to anything because I hadn't read Harry Potter, so I started reading it with a fresh mind. Wow, I thought this book was really something special and I could relate to it. It was very original and I liked the adventures that Henry encountered. I was so enthralled with the book that i read it in 2 days. Afterwords I started reading Harry Potter and I was confused, the stories were strikingly similar. I enjoyed Harry Potter, but it didn't have that special charm I got when reading Wizard's Hall. In the end my teacher made the class write an essay about comparing the two books and also state which one was more original and interesting. Everybody else wrote that Harry Potter was original and that Wizard's Hall was boring and the same as Harry Potter, but I wrote how Wizard's Hall was actually written BEFORE Harry Potter and that it was way more original and interesting for it's time. I was the ONLY person in my class to get an A+ on my essay :).

Rating:
Summary: Cute
Review: This is very hard to do, but I will tell you about Wizard's Hall now WITHOUT comparing it to Harry Potter (*gasp*). This book is very short, but the story is well-developed for the time span of the book. If the characters, especially the Magisters, are a little under-developed, that is because the main character, Henry, hasn't had much time to get to know them anyway. Very soon after finding himself in the famous Wizard's Hall, an interesting, bizarre school for young people wanting to become wizards (or witches), our main character finds out about a plot for the ruin of the Hall, kept secret by the teachers. Only he, blundering and seemingly un-magical, can save the school. To calm himself, Henry always remembers things that his Mama told him, or thought about his cow--the only two things in his life before he went to school. The meaning of his school-name, Thornmallow, is repeated a little too often (prickly on the outside, squishy within) but by the end you see why. Heartwarming, simple, and enjoyable, but, like all Yolen's books (eg: Dragon Blood, etc) ends almost TOO early, and leaves you unsatisfied! Not necesarily a bad thing...

Rating:
Summary: Wizards Hall
Review: WIZARD'S HALL is the original book of young wizards. It's original and the best book to sit down by a fire with on a rainy day. It's not complicated wich makes the book so interesting. It makes simple statements and is a different style of writing.
It is about a boy who decides to become a wizard. He is sent to a simple school where the teachers are worried about an evil villan.To tell more would be giving away would be too much and disposing of certain qualities the book maintains.

Rating:
Summary: Wizards Hall
Review: Wizards Hall is about a 12 year old boy who goes to a magic school and ends up saving the whole school. This does not compare with the Harry Potter series because it does not have as much action and it is quite a bit shorter.

Wizards Hall is where children go study magic after learning if they're witches or wizards. Doctor Morning Glory, or Dr. Mo, a witch who is under the spell of an enchantment, and Register Oakbend, an old wizard professor who is blind and speaks in riddles, tells them if they are able to become a witch or wizard.

All students get new names. Henry's name is Thornmallow because he is prickly on the outside an squishy within. Henry meets new friends and makes an enemy but the whole story goes along slowly until it turns out the school is in danger and they need 113 students to make a spell to kill the monster. they also have to defeat it's master because he would have killed them it they didn't.

I like this book because it teaches a lesson to always be willing to try.

If you like books about magic than you will like this one.I would recommend this to another fourth grader because it is just a good book period.