Summoned (Redemption's Heir #1)
Publication: 24th June 2014
Publisher: Tor Teen
Pages: 320
Genre: Fantasy
Age Appropriate: Young Adult
When the Elder Gods extend an invitation, be wary of the strings attached
While browsing in a rare book store in Arkham, Sean finds an occult book with an ad seeking an apprentice sorcerer, from a newspaper dated March 21, 1895. Even more intriguing, the ad specifically requests applicants reply by email.
Sean’s always been interested in magic, particularly the Lovecraftian dark mythology. Against his best friend Edna's ("call-me-Eddy-or-else") advice, he decides to answer the ad, figuring it’s a clever hoax, but hoping that it won’t be. The advertiser, Reverend Redemption Orne, claims to be a master of the occult born more than 300 years ago. To prove his legitimacy, Orne gives Sean instructions to summon a harmless but useful familiar—but Sean’s ceremony takes a dark turn, and he instead accidentally beckons a bloodthirsty servant to the Cthulhu Mythos god Nyarlathotep. The ritual is preemptively broken, and now Sean must find and bind the servitor, before it grows too strong to contain. But strange things are already happening in the town of Arkham....
While browsing in a rare book store in Arkham, Sean finds an occult book with an ad seeking an apprentice sorcerer, from a newspaper dated March 21, 1895. Even more intriguing, the ad specifically requests applicants reply by email.
Sean’s always been interested in magic, particularly the Lovecraftian dark mythology. Against his best friend Edna's ("call-me-Eddy-or-else") advice, he decides to answer the ad, figuring it’s a clever hoax, but hoping that it won’t be. The advertiser, Reverend Redemption Orne, claims to be a master of the occult born more than 300 years ago. To prove his legitimacy, Orne gives Sean instructions to summon a harmless but useful familiar—but Sean’s ceremony takes a dark turn, and he instead accidentally beckons a bloodthirsty servant to the Cthulhu Mythos god Nyarlathotep. The ritual is preemptively broken, and now Sean must find and bind the servitor, before it grows too strong to contain. But strange things are already happening in the town of Arkham....
My Thoughts.
Summoned is the first book in an all new young adult series Redemption's Heir by Anne M. Pillsworth, set in the fantasy genre, with a hint of mythology thrown in as well.We are introduced to teenager Sean who with his best-friend Eddy are browsing in an occult book shop when Sean comes across an extremely old book which when opened is found to contain a newspaper clipping from 1895, what's strange about that you may ask, well there's a circled ad for somebody searching for an apprentice sorcerer, applicants are asked to email to request an interview, thinking that it's a very well thought out joke, although Eddy is wary they email only to discover that Reverend Orne seriously believes that sorcerer's and witches are real, and even claims to be a sorcerer himself born 300 years ago!
To determine whether Sean has any inkling of magic he sets him a task of performing a summoning spell, against his better judgement and ignoring Eddy's warnings he goes ahead with it, and that's when everything goes catastrophically wrong.
Accidentally summoning a servitor who is a servant to the Cthulhu Mythos god Nyarlathotep, who's main source of sustenance are animals and if given the chance humans, Sean is terrified and unintentionally let's the servitor get away before he gets a chance to bind the creature to him.
Sean must find a way with the help of his family and friends to find a spell to counteract the summoning spell to send the servitor back where it came from before it's too late and Sean is driven crazy by the constant melding of their minds.
While this was an enjoyable read I felt more excited by the concept rather than the actual story, I do plan to carry on with the series though as I'm curious to see how this series turns out.
I would have liked to see a section somewhere in the book with pronounciations of the names, as a lot of them were hard to figure out and it would have made reading it a little more easier.
I give this 3/5 stars.
I was born in Troy, New York, but I currently live just outside Providence, Rhode Island, at the head of beautiful Narragansett Bay. New England has long been my spiritual home, and the region informs much of my fiction. One day I hope to find Lovecraft's portals to his mythical towns of witch-haunted Arkham and Kingsport, shadowed Innsmouth and accursed Dunwich. Until then, I'll just have to write about them..
I am a member of SFWA and HWA and a rabid Austenite. Don't those three always go together?
Apart from writing, I like gardening, swimming, king cobras, jumping spiders, and cats. No cobras or cats at the moment, but the jumping spiders are always with us. In spite of maintaining a mental age of between twelve and sixteen, I have just married my partner of more than thirty years. Thanks to the RI Legislature for finally living up to Roger Williams' philosophy of crabbing at people he disagreed with but never denying the primacy of the personal conscience.
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