Hyddenworld: Awakening

William Horwood

2011

0230712614 

This book opened with a more in-depth retelling of the final chapters of the book that preceded it, which I appreciated.  Dropping catch-up details throughout a book can get irritating, so it was a refreshing change to have it all done and out of the way right from the beginning.

Spring was about Brum, and Englalond.  This second installment has expanded the world to Europe, and the entire Earth, and follows characters on all sides of the struggle for the Spring gem.  Less about Jack and more about the world at large.

Judith, the Shield Maiden, is a tortured character, one moment a child and the next more adult than her parents, but her story was less interesting to me than that of Bedwyn Stort.  I wouldn’t have guessed from the first book that his thread would have been such an important one.

I found this book to be more interesting and slightly more adult than the first book.  The language is still wonderfully easy to absorb, in spite of the more complex politics and ideas, and hints of things to come.  It follows well with the idea of each book being a season in the story, and I’m looking forward to seeing how Autumn and Winter develop.

Finished 16/10/13