One of my favourite things about the Mark of the Fool series was that the main character, Alex Roth, ignored the call to adventure when he was chosen as one of the Five Heroes and instead ran off to magic school. It was entertaining and the way he worked around the restrictions of his choosing was great to see.

But the thing about a call to adventure is that, accept it or reject it, you’re still reacting to it. And by the end of the last book he’d decided to accept it, though on his own terms. So I was expecting this book to be about the expedition back to Thameland.

But expeditions take time to arrange, especially when there’s a demon summoner running about causing chaos, and so the preparations for the expedition instead mostly happen in the background while Alex and his Cabal focus on their summer term.

It’s not quite what I expected and I would have liked them to head straight back to Thameland, so it felt like this was more of a waiting period or filler arc than anything else. But there were new lessons and a Magic Olympics in it so it’s not like nothing’s going on.

In a way it did feel like a summer’s holiday. There’s a lot going on and you’re having a lot of fun but in the back of your mind you know that the end of the holiday is coming and you’re going to get back to work. And as much as I enjoyed this book, and I did, I can’t wait for the next one.