Book Review: The Chronicles of Kazam series

 

• The Last Dragonslayer (2010), The Song of the Quarkbeast (2011), The Eye of Zoltar (2014), and The Great Troll War (2021)
• Author: Jasper Fforde
• Where I bought these books: Various book sellers over the years; bookshop.org for the finale 
• Why I bought these books: Fforde is an inventive and witty writer. "Quark," said the Quarkbeast

    

********

    I recently noticed that the subtitle of The Great Troll War is A Last Dragonslayer Novel. So maybe the use of the indefinite article means it's not the end, like we are all led to believe? Maybe, just maybe, there is room in the future for more tales about Jennifer Strange, the Kazam Mystical Arts, and the Ununited Kingdoms? 

    We can only hope. 

    It was a joy for me to read this Young Adult series -- and I am a person to whom the term decidedly does not apply. The series has all the attributes of the Jasper Fforde oeuvre -- the imaginative yet cerebral tales of fantasy highlighted by clever and bantering dialogue.    

    Okay, he sometimes gets carried away, but it's all in great fun. He gives us a sardonic view of authority, farcical side tales, and whimsical if grounded characters.

    Take this series, for instance, set in the Ununited Kingdoms, a place similar to Great Britain in an alternative dimension. It is a land where trolls -- 25-feet tall, the tattooed characters eat humans and consider them vermin -- are confined to the northern tier, and the Kingdoms routinely go to war with them, and routinely lose. 

    In Fforde world, this accomplishes several things: It allows the various kings, moptopps, dukes, potentates, and other inept rulers to have an enemy to blame for their failures, test out their new war toys, and provide more orphans who are the key to their society.

    Oh yes, there are dragons, quarkbeasts, tralfamosaurs, and other magically created beasts. And while magic is on the decline, it remains useful for things such as repairing bridges and the like.

    Enter Jennifer Strange, whom we first meet in the first book at age 15 when her orphanage apprenticeship has her going to work for Kazam Mystical Arts Management -- and who ends up running the place, despite her lack of magical skills.

   Fast forward through three books while she does her duty, and we learn more about the skills of this irreverent and brilliant character.

The Great Troll War with my breakfast*

    In this long-delayed fourth book, The Great Troll War, the trolls have taken over and surrounded most of the Kingdoms, creating Greater Trollvania. They are on the verge of invading the Kingdom of Hereford, where Jennifer and her magical friends live, but have been stopped at the border by a ditch filled with buttons (it's one of their few fears; so is a certain shade of cerulean). 

    Jennifer must somehow fix this problem. Her army includes a dozen spoiled princesses and two teenaged dragons. Along the way she negotiates with Molly, a troll who cannot eat her because she is part of the 6.67 percent of vegetarian trolls. (Keep that math in mind. It's important.) (Also, because there are quarkbeasts, physics may be involved. But just a little.)

    So, that's the plot, more or less. I may have explained some things improperly, but it's sometimes hard to keep track of everything in the Ununited Kingdoms. But it sure is amusing to try. 

                _______________________________________  

*Tea and scones play a role in the books as a treat or snack. Particularly at the Globe, "a late-night scone bar . . . that served top-quality scones until the clotted cream ran out or a fight started."