What We’re Reading

The Bartimaeus Trilogy, Book Three: Ptolemy’s Gate | Jonathan Stroud

Rating:

First and foremost, if you haven’t read the first two books of this trilogy (The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem’s Eye), I wouldn’t start with this one. Without all the back-story there’s a lot to miss. That being said, I think this might have been the best of the three.

We’re back in London, after the downfall of the Lovelace affair, and Nathaniel/Jonathan Mandrake, is now Information Minister. The Commoners are growing restless, the war in America is going poorly, and Bartimaeus has been kept in service for so long that his powers are all but gone. The government is beginning to split into factions, everyone is always looking over their shoulders, and the lower magicians seem to be plotting something.

It turns out the elusive Hopkins is returned. Finding him becomes top priority. In the meantime, Mandrake also learns that Kitty Jones is not, as he had thought, dead. Finding her then becomes his top priority. And just when it seems like things might be falling into place….everything comes apart.

The entire government is kidnapped, the streets overflow with commoners who’ve noticed a lack of government response, and Mandrake and Kitty have fallen into the middle of a most sordid plot.

This was the quickest read of the trilogy, for me, and even though I knew it was winding down, in the end I harbor hopes that perhaps there will be another story someday.

Find it in the Catalog