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A review by deeb_reads
The Iron Trial by Cassandra Clare, Holly Black
2.0
I'm going to clear a few things up first:
1) I am not a rabid Cassandra Clare hater. I enjoyed a few of her books, and the plagiarism accusations against the Mortal Instruments series didn't consciously affect my rating.
2) I am aware that there are series besides Harry Potter where there are 2 guys and 1 girl, and they have magical powers!
3) This isn't a hate review where I complain about Ms. Black or Ms. Clare. This is 100% about the book itself and not said authors.
Yeah, now onto the review.
As I'm sure you've heard from Lola's review, Giselle's review, or perhaps Mizuki's review, this book is a heck of a lot like our beloved Harry Potter. I mean a HECK OF A LOT: so much that either the authors and editors willfully copied the HP universe or just turned an extremely, extremely blind eye to all the similarities popping up.
Let's see. The villain is an evil but extremely powerful wizard (or mage, in this book) who wants to cheat death, dubbing himself as the Enemy of Death. He went to war with the other mages/wizards and killed a whole bunch of them, including our MC's mom, and nearly killed our MC, Call, but didn't, and only left him with a scar- a lame leg that never healed. (Boy who lived? You betcha.) Even more suspiciously, the EoD vanished after that attack and hasn't shown up for years. Fast forward. Call lives with his dad, who is kind of an anti-mage crackpot, despite being a mage himself, and demands Call not be trained at the magic school place, because he hates mages and he's paranoid. He's also a pretty crappy dad, since people can heal other people with magic, but for some reason, the book never shows him attempting to heal Call's leg, which pains Call frequently. I guess the dad is basically the Dursleys, except rolled up into one guy. The magical school is kind of similar to Hogwarts, too- it's basically middle/high school and is hidden in the countryside, and has a whole bunch of weird magical food and hangout spots. Call passes the entrance test, and the teachers drag him off to the Magisterium on a bus (not a train) without his dad's permission, and the characters we meet are also like HP. We have know-it-all infodumper Tamara, except she's more of a snob than Hermione. We have a stuck-up bully, who hates Call for being *speshul* or whatever, Jasper, and he's basically a half-Asian version of Draco. (Why, Jasper, did you have to be the only Asian character! Why?!?) We have Master Rufus, the wise old mage, who takes our heroes under his wing and is basically Dumbledore except without the beard and looking kind of like Mace Windu. Call himself is a troublemaker, like Harry, and also like Harry, is somewhat famous due to surviving the EoD.
Oh, and the Enemy of Death himself is basically Voldemort. Even the names- Voldemort is derived from the word Mort, or death. They both have screwed-up faces. They both want to cheat death using forbidden spells. The EoD's Chaos-ridden minions are basically Inferi, like in [b: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince|1|Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)|J.K. Rowling|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1361039191s/1.jpg|41335427]. And there's also a HUGE and extremely obvious similarity that Clare and Black and their editors would be BLIND to not see.
Yeah, think about it.
Secondly, Clare and Black could have distinguished this from HP by having a "will he turn out just like the EoD?" Nature v. Nurture thing going on. But they didn't.
That Clare and Black not only either copied HP or just ignored the extreme similarities is one thing, but the fact that they missed dozens of opportunities to distinguish this book from Harry Potter is another. Read the spoiler above at your own risk if you need an example, but here are a few more: the "I don't want to be a mage" thing and the "Oh no, I'm not the special snowflake, but my bestie Aaron is!" were totally underplayed.
You know what, correct me if I'm wrong, but while we're talking about Harry Potter, is it just me or does Kylo Ren look like Snape? You know, with the hair and everything?
In conclusion of this segment, the HP similarities totally ruined it. It would have been OK had I not read HP or known of HP's existence, but it also suffered from other non HP problems.
1) It was boring. There isn't really a plot until someone kidnaps Aaron about 30 pages from the end and Tamara and Call have to save him.
2) The worldbuilding was vague, even of the school. I didn't really get how kids were supposed to learn anything, and as Lola's review pointed out, the Magisterium seemed more like a camp than an actual school.
3) What wasn't obviously an Harry Potter thing was cliche or a trope. Aaron, the 3rd member of Call's trio, is the standard Golden Boy trope. There's also a grumpy Council of magicness, and the whole Chaos thing sounds a lot like the Dark Side or something.
Other than that, it was fairly enjoyable, and standard Middle Grade fare. Maybe if I was younger, I'd have liked it more.
Conclusion: This book was ruined by the huge amounts of Harry Potter similarities, its unoriginality, and lack of worldbuilding. However, it's only standard middle grade, and is readable.
Oh, and one more HP meme. You deserve it for reading this long review.
1) I am not a rabid Cassandra Clare hater. I enjoyed a few of her books, and the plagiarism accusations against the Mortal Instruments series didn't consciously affect my rating.
2) I am aware that there are series besides Harry Potter where there are 2 guys and 1 girl, and they have magical powers!
3) This isn't a hate review where I complain about Ms. Black or Ms. Clare. This is 100% about the book itself and not said authors.
Yeah, now onto the review.
As I'm sure you've heard from Lola's review, Giselle's review, or perhaps Mizuki's review, this book is a heck of a lot like our beloved Harry Potter. I mean a HECK OF A LOT: so much that either the authors and editors willfully copied the HP universe or just turned an extremely, extremely blind eye to all the similarities popping up.
Let's see. The villain is an evil but extremely powerful wizard (or mage, in this book) who wants to cheat death, dubbing himself as the Enemy of Death. He went to war with the other mages/wizards and killed a whole bunch of them, including our MC's mom, and nearly killed our MC, Call, but didn't, and only left him with a scar- a lame leg that never healed. (Boy who lived? You betcha.) Even more suspiciously, the EoD vanished after that attack and hasn't shown up for years. Fast forward. Call lives with his dad, who is kind of an anti-mage crackpot, despite being a mage himself, and demands Call not be trained at the magic school place, because he hates mages and he's paranoid. He's also a pretty crappy dad, since people can heal other people with magic, but for some reason, the book never shows him attempting to heal Call's leg, which pains Call frequently. I guess the dad is basically the Dursleys, except rolled up into one guy. The magical school is kind of similar to Hogwarts, too- it's basically middle/high school and is hidden in the countryside, and has a whole bunch of weird magical food and hangout spots. Call passes the entrance test, and the teachers drag him off to the Magisterium on a bus (not a train) without his dad's permission, and the characters we meet are also like HP. We have know-it-all infodumper Tamara, except she's more of a snob than Hermione. We have a stuck-up bully, who hates Call for being *speshul* or whatever, Jasper, and he's basically a half-Asian version of Draco. (Why, Jasper, did you have to be the only Asian character! Why?!?) We have Master Rufus, the wise old mage, who takes our heroes under his wing and is basically Dumbledore except without the beard and looking kind of like Mace Windu. Call himself is a troublemaker, like Harry, and also like Harry, is somewhat famous due to surviving the EoD.
Oh, and the Enemy of Death himself is basically Voldemort. Even the names- Voldemort is derived from the word Mort, or death. They both have screwed-up faces. They both want to cheat death using forbidden spells. The EoD's Chaos-ridden minions are basically Inferi, like in [b: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince|1|Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)|J.K. Rowling|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1361039191s/1.jpg|41335427]. And there's also a HUGE and extremely obvious similarity that Clare and Black and their editors would be BLIND to not see.
Spoiler
THE EoD'S SOUL IS INSIDE OF CALLLLLLLLLL! OK, some people have said, well, only PART of Harry is Voldemort, whereas 100% of Call is supposedly the EoD. But come on, how many books do you have where the death-cheating antagonist puts his SOUL inside the MC?Yeah, think about it.
Secondly, Clare and Black could have distinguished this from HP by having a "will he turn out just like the EoD?" Nature v. Nurture thing going on. But they didn't.
That Clare and Black not only either copied HP or just ignored the extreme similarities is one thing, but the fact that they missed dozens of opportunities to distinguish this book from Harry Potter is another. Read the spoiler above at your own risk if you need an example, but here are a few more: the "I don't want to be a mage" thing and the "Oh no, I'm not the special snowflake, but my bestie Aaron is!" were totally underplayed.
You know what, correct me if I'm wrong, but while we're talking about Harry Potter, is it just me or does Kylo Ren look like Snape? You know, with the hair and everything?
In conclusion of this segment, the HP similarities totally ruined it. It would have been OK had I not read HP or known of HP's existence, but it also suffered from other non HP problems.
1) It was boring. There isn't really a plot until someone kidnaps Aaron about 30 pages from the end and Tamara and Call have to save him.
2) The worldbuilding was vague, even of the school. I didn't really get how kids were supposed to learn anything, and as Lola's review pointed out, the Magisterium seemed more like a camp than an actual school.
3) What wasn't obviously an Harry Potter thing was cliche or a trope. Aaron, the 3rd member of Call's trio, is the standard Golden Boy trope. There's also a grumpy Council of magicness, and the whole Chaos thing sounds a lot like the Dark Side or something.
Other than that, it was fairly enjoyable, and standard Middle Grade fare. Maybe if I was younger, I'd have liked it more.
Conclusion: This book was ruined by the huge amounts of Harry Potter similarities, its unoriginality, and lack of worldbuilding. However, it's only standard middle grade, and is readable.
Oh, and one more HP meme. You deserve it for reading this long review.