PHYSIK

Showing no signs of reaching a climax, this Potter-esque series ambles past its 1,500th page with another escapade that casts apprentice Magyk-worker Septimus and apprentice princess Jenna into various dangers in a setting well-stocked with ghosts, near-ghosts, secret passages, magical creatures, comical stock characters and dark doings. Newly sprung from centuries of imprisonment in a portrait, the treacherous, not-quite-dead Queen Etheldredda and her rat-like, plague-spreading familiar embark on a campaign to retake the throne by killing Jenna and stranding Septimus 500 years in the past. To help foil the Queen, Sage trots in several colorful new additions to the already-bewilderingly large supporting cast, including alchemist Marcellus Pye, who has discovered the secret of eternal life but needs Septimus’s special talents to add “eternal youth” to the tincture, and a seafaring young woman (with, oddly, a masculine name) whose cat changes into a panther at night. Readers unfamiliar with the two previous episodes will flounder—but stay entertained nonetheless, thanks to the speedy pace of events and, boosted by expressive vignettes at many chapter heads, strong-minded characters. (map, appendices) (Fantasy. 11-13)