The Unexpected Enlightenment Of Rachel Griffin, by L. Jagi Lamplighter

Last year I wrote that the PROSPERO’S DAUGHTER trilogy, by L. Jagi Lamplighter, was one of the best books I read in 2012 (the other being WOOL by Hugh Howey), and so when she offered me the chance to read her new young adult novel, THE UNEXPECTED ENLIGHTENMENT OF RACHEL GRIFFIN, before it was published, I jumped at the chance.

THE UNEXPECTED ENLIGHTENMENT OF RACHEL GRIFFIN is a young adult novel targeted primarily at girls. The protagonist, one Rachel Griffin, is a twelve-year-old girl sent for her first term at a school for young wizards, run under the auspices of the Parliament of the Wise (what the wizards, rather immodestly, call themselves). Rachel has the good fortune of an eidetic memory and a constant thirst for secrets, which is both an advantage and a liability in a society of wizards. Rachel quickly discovers that all is not well in the world of the Wise, and soon finds herself dealing with a secret society of evil wizards called the Velterdammerung along with the normal concerns of a child.

Having never been a twelve-year-old girl myself, I suspect I am not quite the target audience for this book, but I enjoyed it, and I suspect the target audience would do so as well. Rachel spends a lot of time contemplating her feelings, as one would expect a twelve-year-old girl to do, but not enough to slow down the book. The parallels to Harry Potter are clear (children at wizards school, society of evil wizards, etc.), but this book’s setting has a good deal more depth than Harry Potter’s setting, since it is anchored in real-world history. Simon Magus and Aleister Crowley were among the society of evil wizards, for instance. Additionally, there is an intriguing scene when Rachel and her classmates puzzle over the meaning of the word “monotheism”, since they’ve never encountered the word before, which I suspect is a hook for the next few books in the series.

Beyond that, the characters are sharply drawn, and the book manages the trick of having the children be ignorant of their world without be idiots, and having the more gifted children (like Rachel) be intelligent without being unrealistically clever or precocious prigs. Not every writer can manage that.

Also, a big point in the book’s favor: no weird sex. Or any sex, which to be frank is a welcome change in a YA novel.  The trend of SF/F brimming with weird sex while the author blathers on about gritty realism has quite overstayed its welcome.

To sum up: in THE UNEXPECTED ENLIGHTENMENT, a plucky band of children join forces to fight evil, despite the best efforts of incompetent adults, at a school for wizards. Recommended

-JM