The Bartimaeus Trilogy anyone

[lucidity]

Has anyone read one or all of these fine books by Jonathan Stroud? They include: The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem's Eye and the third which came out early this year, Ptolemy's Gate.

My sister turned me on to these books. They are fabulous, quite funny and endearing.

I'm currently reading the final one of the trilogy and if anyone else has read them I'd love to know what you think. ;D

[Rosie]

I'll look out for these - I've never even heard of them!

[lucidity]

They're fantasy, somewhat simliar to Harry Potter, yet different. They follow a young boy and his shape-shifting djinni. The djinni is Bartimaeus and is quite sarcastic and hilarious.

I must tell you they're considered children's books, yet so is the Potter series.

[StefaniaB]

Lucidity, is the Trilogy based in a Middle Eastern type of fantasy milieu? I've never heard of it, but I would certainly be interested in an a fantasy based in that part of the world.

- Steff

[lucidity]

Here is an editorial review from the Amazon.com site, to give you a general idea of what the book is about. ;D

Amazon.com

Nathaniel is a boy magician-in-training, sold to the government by his birth parents at the age of five and sent to live as an apprentice to a master. Powerful magicians rule Britain, and its empire, and Nathaniel is told his is the "ultimate sacrifice" for a "noble destiny." If leaving his parents and erasing his past life isn't tough enough, Nathaniel's master, Arthur Underwood, is a cold, condescending, and cruel middle-ranking magician in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The boy's only saving grace is the master's wife, Martha Underwood, who shows him genuine affection that he rewards with fierce devotion. Nathaniel gets along tolerably well over the years in the Underwood household until the summer before his eleventh birthday. Everything changes when he is publicly humiliated by the ruthless magician Simon Lovelace and betrayed by his cowardly master who does not defend him.

Nathaniel vows revenge. In a Faustian fever, he devours magical texts and hones his magic skills, all the while trying to appear subservient to his master. When he musters the strength to summon the 5,000-year-old djinni Bartimaeus to avenge Lovelace by stealing the powerful Amulet of Samarkand, the boy magician plunges into a situation more dangerous and deadly than anything he could ever imagine. In British author Jonathan Stroud's excellent novel, the first of The Bartimaeus Trilogy, the story switches back and forth from Bartimaeus's first-person point of view to third-person narrative about Nathaniel. Here's the best part: Bartimaeus is absolutely hilarious, with a wit that snaps, crackles, and pops. His dryly sarcastic, irreverent asides spill out into copious footnotes that no one in his or her right mind would skip over. A sophisticated, suspenseful, brilliantly crafted, dead-funny book that will leave readers anxious for more. (Ages 11 to adult)

I think they are quite funny, athough the first book is by far the best.