The Curer

THE CURER by Adam Nichols
Millennium (Victor Gollancz) - April 2001
ISBN: 1857985311 - Paperback
Fantasy / Contemporary
Mild enough for Young Adults

Reviewed by Rachel A Hyde, MyShelf.com
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This is the third and final volume of Nichols' Whiteblade Saga, telling of the exploits of Elinor Whiteblade and her magical sword as she wanders across her world in search of adventures. Young Pawli lives with his drug-addled old uncle Brynmaur who has the gift of a Curer but won't train Pawli, preferring to warn him off such magical things and urge him to settle down. But when one of Bryn's former students Khurdis Blackeye wants to rule over the Three Valleys and conjures up trouble (not being a very adept magician) Pawli and Bryn have to try to put things right - together with a certain mysterious stranger who turns out to be Elinor Whiteblade.

Nichols can tell a story and has proved this in the first two books of this trilogy but this time the whole thing seems a little long and stretched out. Gone are the cute talking animals (and most of the gore) but when Nichols wrote about them rollicking adventures tended to happen that kept the other books rolling along. If it had been half as long it would have been twice as good and when the trio are in the other realm all the old sparkle returns but there isn't quite enough story to fill the whole novel. But these gripes aside it is an entertaining enough tale with some quite inventive aspects and I look forward to finding out what Nichols is going to conjure up next.