The Rise of the Wyrm Lord, the second in The Door Within Trilogy by Wayne Thomas Batson, is a beautiful hardback put out by Tommy Nelson. The Door Within, the first book in the trilogy is bound with a royal blue paper over board cover with a dust jacket to match. That book has pages that are tinged blue along with blue font. This second book is purple--cover, pages, and font--and The Final Storm, the last book, is a deep green. Very cool books. It is no wonder I see them stocked face-out at Borders, the only CBA representatives in the children's section. I was so happy to find Tommy Nelson making such beautiful books that I snapped one up the first time I saw it. I had to have it.

So how does the story stack up when placed next to the fun binding, colored pages, and font?

The Rise of the Wyrm Lord starts with Aidan, who was the protagonist in the first book, having visions and reading a journal which gave me reason to believe that he would be going back to The Realm, a parallel universe to which he traveled in the previous book.

But Aidan, for reasons unknown, does not return to The Realm in this volume. Instead, Antoinette, a feisty, sword-fighting female, goes to ride as the twelfth knight. I found the switch from Aidan to Antoinette to be a bit of a bump.

This book also started slowly for me--not because there wasn't scary stuff going on but because the scary stuff didn't carry any bite. No one I cared about was in danger. And that lack of conflict is the biggest problem with the book. Even after Antoinette makes it to the Realm there is still nothing at stake. If Antoinette fails the first two tests and loses her chance to ride with the elite Knights of Alleble, she will go home with a bruised ego perhaps, but nothing more drastic than that.

This is not to say that readers won't enjoy the pace. They may find the knights interesting enough to hold them. I didn't, but others may. Still, I don't think anyone can say the book starts out as gripping--Antoinette's motive for going to the Realm is not strong, and the danger if she fails in her quest is not strong, or at least, I didn't think Mr. Batson sufficiently painted these things for me. So the book was, I thought, put-downable in the first hundred pages or so.

In chapter fourteen, that changes. Finally there is danger to our gal and the pages started flipping faster. And from that point on this book is very enjoyable.

Strong points? Bad guys who have the potential to be truly scary--the Wyrm Lord and the Seven Sleepers. Had we seen more of these dangerous beings the story would have been truly gripping because there is no doubt these guys are creepy. I also thought the chemistry between Antoinette and Aelic was good--I liked both characters. I liked many of the Knights, too, which reminds me of another strong point--noble knights and evil knights mixing it up with sword fights and arrows flying fast and furious.

The part I enjoyed most about the book, though, was Yewland, Nock's leafy home. I loved the descriptions of the cities in the trees and found myself wishing I could visit. I also think that Wayne Thomas Batson has quite the imagination and has a big story to tell. The story is building to a final showdown between the good king and the evil one who rebelled and I will surely buy the next book to see how it all turns out.

OK. OK. I'm pretty sure the good side is going to win. But will our heroes and heroines survive? Will they win over the people they love? I have every reason to believe, from reading the first two books, that the final chapter in the trilogy will be imaginative and big. Big battles, big wins, big losses.

I also hope to see more of the creatures and places where Batson's brilliance shines through, like the happy treetops in Yewland or like Falon's maze. Besides that, while Batson started slowly, he didn't end that way. He left us with a cliffhanger, folks. He's apparently learning that to keep reader interest you have to have your characters in danger.

And thus he leaves us.

Guess I can't complain about that now, since I was earlier bemoaning the lack of danger.

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Copyright © 2005 Sally Apokedak