Sabriel

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How do I review a book that I've read so many times I've actually lost count? For starters — this is a warning that I probably won't be as objective or unbiased as I could be, because at this point it's pretty hard for me to be either of those things. The Old Kingdom is one of my absolute favorite series. I first picked up Sabriel in seventh grade. I was a wee pre-teen, and I just fell in love with this story. And I have to say — it's held up pretty well for being close to thirty years old!

At it's heart, Sabriel is about a young girl thrust into an awful situation, and how she grows and learns from her experiences. A coming-of-age story, to a T. What I've always loved is that Sabriel doesn't really have YA main-character syndrome. She's not really described as being better than other girls. She's not described as beautiful when we first meet her. She's just a teenager, a young woman about to graduate from her school. She's shown to be competent, but not overly so, and there are more than a few times where she makes mistakes and owns up to them. Sabriel is an excellent role model for young girls.

I love the world, too, though we don't get a huge sense of how big it is in this particular book. It gets explored much more in the subsequent sequels, so I won't mention much of it here, other than to say that Nix does an excellent job of making the world feel old. We see the history in bits and pieces, the way the cities and towns are described, and how the people are living in them.

I'm also incredibly partial to the other characters in Sabriel, though my absolute favorite doesn't appear until Lirael. Mogget is a pretty close runner-up, though. Talking animal companions are some of my favorites, always, and he is so mysterious and funny that you can't help but love him. And then when you do find out what he is, oooh. It's such a good reveal, though you don't really understand the gravity of it until later books, again. Touchstone is another fascinating character — a berserker with royal blood. He and Sabriel fall in love very quickly, but they do spend the majority of their time together saving each other's lives over and over.

The villain of this book, Kerrigor, is properly terrifying, with some serious oomph behind his threats. Who and what he is just sends shivers down my spine every time I read this book. And the way they defeat him? GOD, IT'S SO GOOD.

See how it's hard for me to be unbiased?