Wild Magic by Tamora Pierce

Wild Magic was honestly a lot more fun that I was expecting. I feel like Tamora Pierce was trying to recapture some of this book when she wrote Tempests and Slaughter. Daine’s schooling in her magic definitely had a better feel than Numair’s did. I also like Daine a lot more than I liked Arram/Numair. I also feel like Daine in terms of being introduced to Tortall’s “elite.” They are all really welcoming and open, which makes a change from other “elite” groups from other series.

So yeah, Tortall is a weird place. The palace is super informal apparently. Kind of makes sense given that it’s a home and a training ground and a royal palace all wrapped up in one. Pretty sure Tortall ruined all the more formal royals for me.

I started this review talking about how Arram/Numair’s magical schooling was a lot different from Daine’s. Part of that is Numair being in charge of Daine’s schooling and part of it is Carthak’s mage-training school. I felt a lot more involved in Daine’s “schooling” and actually understood what was going on when Numair explained it to her. I really enjoy that sort of nerdy-in-the-weeds kind of thing involving magic systems. It’s fun.

I also enjoyed the way Daine interacted with her animal friends. She is both of them and yet not, which makes for some interesting dynamics. Cloud, especially, is a stand out.

I sweat I’ve read the Daine series before, but I can’t really remember much, if anything. That makes a lot of the introduction of the “immortal” characters/creatures interesting. I definitely ran into some of them during the Kel series, but I’d plum forgotten how they ended up coming back into the Tortallan world. I kind of missed them during the Beka and Alanna series… but then, I’m a sucker for my mythological elements.

Wild Magic is honestly a really good jumping on point for anyone interested in reading the Tortall books. I feel like there’s enough detail to bother hook readers and keep them interested while at the same time not info-dumping too hard. 

Favorite Line

"The person who commits an action is the one responsible for it, not the people he commits the action upon." - Numair