Review: Weatherend "A Well-Plotted Juvenile With Interesting Characters"

Book review: The Dark Secret of Weatherend

The category of fantastic thriller in which supernatural forces intrude into everyday life is perhaps best typified for adult readers by the novels of Charles Williams, for younger audiences by those of Madeleine L'Engle. John Bellairs brings back two characters from an earlier novel in a work reminiscent of Williams and L'Engle which also manages to retain a strong individuality of style.

The hero, Anthony Monday, is a fourteen-year-old with a fondness for red leather caps, mystery novels, and his best friend, Miss Eells, an eccentric librarian who drives an ancient Dodge. They uncover a plot by the evil Anders Borkman to destroy the world by sorcerous manipulation of the weather. The two must, of course, do battle.

Wit, courage, occult knowledge, and Roman Catholic ritual blend pleasingly in a well-plotted juvenile with interesting characters, and if the ending is a bit tidy, it is also satisfying.

Carol D. Stevens
Fantasy Review, Vol. 7, No. 9, October, 1984, p. 41.