Reviews for The Old Magic (Merlin Series, Part 1)

The average rating for The Old Magic (Merlin Series, Part 1) based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-07-06 00:00:00 Jeff Deshazer I should admit, my high rating of this series is more to do with the fact that I am a massive fangirl of the miniseries that this is based on, rather than any particular qualities of the books themselves. Not to say that they are bad as stand alone books, but I wouldn't say that they were spectacular either- it could definitely have used a bit of proof reading in parts (Merlin, at one point, seems to have gotten confused as to when he last saw Mab in Book 3, for example, and the way the final battle is written seems a bit at odds with how it is portrayed in the actual series). For fans of the miniseries, these are definitely worth a read, particularly Book 1 and 3, as there are a lot of "extra scenes", if you will, which make interesting additions, and it's fun to see inside the heads of some of the characters. Book 2 is probably the weakest, as it contains the majority of the actual televised story (running from around halfway through Episode 1 to halfway through Episode 2), and so is mostly a direct screen-to-page translation, with little room for anything else. I think it perhaps would have benefited by being stretched into another book, but maybe that's just me. But, yes. Overall, definitely worth a read if you are a fan of the series- it's hard to say otherwise.

Review # 2 was written on 2016-01-15 00:00:00 Veronica Maher Part of a wonderful trilogy that was written based on the Hallmark movie. These books flush out both Merlin and Arthur's story from the beginnings of Merlin's life till the end of Arthur's. This first book focuses on Merlin's early life, his family, how he meets his worst enemy and his greatest love. This trilogy goes into so much more depth and characterization which is wonderful. Merlin's origin story is slightly different in this version than anything else I have read or seen, but the uniqueness is what makes it creative. Merlin's life's course is established in this book based on what happens to him, we get to follow that course in books two and three.