THE DEMON’S LEXICON by Sarah Rees Brennan
I liked this book enormously. And I liked it from the very first paragraph: “The pipe under the sink was leaking again. It wouldn’t have been so bad, except that Nick kept his favourite sword under the sink.” Fifteen-year-old Nick, the practical one, gets on with the repair, while eighteen-year-old Alan cooks dinner. “There was only an instant’s warning . . . Then the window exploded inward, a sharp burst of glittering shards caught in the fluorescent lights. . . . In through the window came an unkindness of ravens. . . . These birds were obviously under the control of a demon, and there would be a magician watching to make sure the demon did its job. . . .
“[Nick] went to Alan’s side with his sword at the ready. . . . Alan’s eyes narrowed behind his glasses. He took aim and fired . . . the demon didn’t have a chance.
“Nick pointed. ‘There!’
“Alan fired again, and where a bird had been was a man falling. . . .”
And that’s all in the first six pages.*
Nick and his brother Alan and their mother have been on the run for as long as Nick can remember. It used to be Nick, Alan, their mum and their dad, but the first time the magicians had caught them, when Nick was eight, their dad had died, to give the other three the chance to escape. When their dad was still alive: “There had been a lot of moving but always to houses that were warm, places with gardens and lots of room. Nick never worried where his next meal was coming from, and never worried that someone might try to kill them. Nick had known the magicians were hunting them, and Dad had made sure they knew how to fight. It was just that Nick never really believed the magicians could get past Dad. . . . It had been eight years. They had been running ever since, hardly able to keep themselves fed, hardly able to escape when they were cornered. . . .”
At the end of the evening when the magicians found them for this second time, Alan, who is lame from the wound he received the first time eight years ago, has received a first-tier demon mark while trying to be useful to a brother and sister who have come to them for help:
“There was a noise outside. . . . [Nick] walked quietly to the back door. Alan could not follow him. Alan was not very good at stealth, because of his leg. . . . [Nick] nudged the door open with his sword point. . . . Nick lunged . . . [and] stopped with his sword poised against a girl’s throat. . . .
“She did not even flinch. . . . All she did was swallow very gently against the blade and say, ‘I heard this was the place to come if you had a problem that was . . . out of the ordinary.’”
The reason they need help is because her brother has a third-tier mark. Third-tier means death.
There are all sorts of reasons to love this book. The plot; the characters; the humour, much of it off hand: “Nick laid his sword down on the draining board with a metallic clink . . .” and several pages later: “[Alan] pushed Nick’s sword away with sudsy fingers to make room for a wet frying pan.” Or: “Someone had carelessly put a dark closet where the hall should have been . . .”
Jamie, the boy with the third-tier mark, has asked Nick about magicians. Nick finishes: “‘. . . Some magicians are rich, some are famous, some are stupidly good-looking.’
“Jamie gave Nick a rather complicated look.
“Nick raised an eyebrow. ‘Some of us manage to be stupidly good-looking on our own.’
“‘Er,’ said Jamie, and cut himself on the cheese grater.
“‘I have changed my mind,’ Nick announced. ‘You can help cook by standing in a corner and not touching anything. Do it carefully.’
“He said it without heat. . . . . Most conversations he had with people from school went a lot worse than this.
“Jamie was quiet, fidgeting with an oven glove on the countertop.
“‘Don’t hurt yourself with that,’ Nick advised. . . .”
And Nick is a great character. You know pretty soon that he has a secret, but you don’t know what it is. Neither does he. You figure it out before he does . . . but contrary to those really annoying murder mysteries where you’re shouting at the detective, For godssake you moron, the butler did it!, it makes perfect sense that Nick doesn’t understand.
Here’s a conversation with Mae, Jamie’s sister:
“ . . . She was crying.
“Nick was appalled. . . . ‘I’ll get Jamie’ . . . when what he really meant was, I’ll get out of here.
“‘No . . . don’t.’ She was starting to look angry again; all things considered, Nick found that soothing . . . ‘I don’t want him to see me cry.’
“‘I don’t want to see you cry either,’ Nick said.
“Her face softened slightly, and he realised she’d taken that the wrong way. Nick imagined spending the next five minutes explaining to her that actually she could cry all the time if she liked, he just didn’t want to see it, and then shut his mouth.
“‘ . . . It’s not really you I’m mad at, anyway. I’m just—I’m scared, and that makes me angry, you know?’
“ ‘Not really,’ Nick answered. . . . ‘I don’t recall ever being scared.’
“Mae looked taken aback.
“ ‘Fear’s useless. . . . Either something bad happens or it doesn’t: If it doesn’t, you’ve wasted time being afraid, and if it does, you’ve wasted time that you could have spent sharpening your weapons.’
“Mae stared at him for a while.
“ ‘You’re lucky you’re cute,’ she said eventually. ‘Because you’re kind of creepy.’
Nick is kind of creepy. And compelling. As is THE DEMON’S LEXICON.** I recommend it highly.***
* * *
* Here’s a link to the entire first chapter: http://www.sarahreesbrennan.com/demonlexchapter1.html
** And I can’t wait for the next one. Except I have to. And wait, and wait. And wait. I’ve had THE DEMON’S COVENANT on order from frelling Waterstones—me the wuss who is still trying to use a real bookstore for on line ordering—since 4 April. When I wrote to customerhahahahahservice a few days ago I got this reply: “The item showing as still outstanding from warehouse from order number **+#!?! has not been updated on your online status.” WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? I WANT MY BOOK.
*** I’m aware that this boat left the harbour last year, with a really big party and lots of champagne and streamers. I’m sorry I missed the champagne. But just in case there’s anybody else who spends too much time in the garden and the bell tower and hasn’t read it yet, this is your heads up that you’re missing a good time. Even if you have to supply your own champagne.
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