“So here’s the thing…

I’ve been reading the Chronicles of Narnia books for the last month or so. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is technically book 2 if you read them in sequence as they relate to years. I’m reading The Silver Chair right now (book 6 of 7) and they’ve all been really good. But my favorite is still The Magician’s Nephew. This is the book that tells us how it all began… Who the uncle is that the Pevensie children go to visit in the Narnia movie… Who Jadis is and where she comes from and how she ends up in Narnia from her own world (No, she didn’t originally live in Narnia) It’s also the book that tells of Narnia’s creation. We get to see Aslan speak the world into existence…the light, the plants, the animals, even the tree that sits far across the mountains. It’s really beautiful to read.

But I just can’t seem to get into this latest book. Probably because… oh shoot! Now, if I say it, you may not want to read it… or worse, not even want to start to read the first one and that would be a real shame. It’s not that this is a badly written book or that the storyline is poor or anything…it’s just that… — SPOILER AHEAD —

The Pevensie kids aren’t actually IN this book. Susan and Peter were told in book 4 that they couldn’t return to Narnia again. And in book 5, Lucy and Edmund also had their last adventure in Narnia. (At least that’s what we’re told… I’ll confirm it after book 7) So who DOES end up in this book? Eustace, their cousin, and his schoolmate, Jill. Eustace shows up in book 5 with Lucy and Edmund by accidentally getting pulled (literally) into an adventure with them. I’m only about 1/3 of the way into the book, but it’s just not the same without the “original cast.” I’ll keep you posted though.