Sabriels father is ‘The Abhorsen’. He’s an extremely powerful magic user who roams the desolate landscape of ‘The Old Kingdom’, a mysterious land on the northern portion of this continent, kept safe from the rest of the world via a wall that contains all magic and dead within. In the south is Ancelstierre, a civilization with early 1900s technology. The closer you get to the wall, the more technology fails or simply falls apart. Things fashioned with mechanical means will even fall apart, the magic itself seemingly killing technology from proximity. The Abhorsen stays north of this wall, roaming the land. Whereas necromancers would raise the dead for their bidding, the Abhorsen puts them down and back to rest as well as taking care of other magical threats such as demons or mages. All magic in this world is caused through musical tones and the Abhorsen is no exception. He wears a bandolier of 7 bells, each growing in size, that must be moved in a specific way to make a specific sound to go along with the specific somatic movement for said spell.
Sabriel is a young woman who was sent south to learn the ways of the world. However one night she gets a message from her father that something is desperately wrong. The Abhorsen is in great trouble and has sent his bandolier of bells, his silvered magical sword, and other items to his daughter. Knowing that if her father did this that all life in the continent may be threatened if whatever took him is able to disable the wall, she sets north to a land she hasn’t been to in many many years. Her magical abilities are not slight but nowhere near the power of her father yet press ahead she must. However she doesn’t always do it alone. One of her companions is a small cat named Kerregor (if memory serves correctly). Kerregor is a massive 300 foot tall demonic world-ending entity that has been contained within the form of an orange cat, kept in that form by a small bell that hangs around his collar. However he is still able to speak and think.
When I was a kid there was only three books but Garth Nix, the author, expanded it to 5!
Incredible fucking series. THe audiobook is narrated by Tim Curry too!
Oh damn, didn't know he'd written more than the original 3. I absolutely adored Garth Nix when I was younger, the keys to the kingdom series too. Might have to revisit and add the last two abhorsen books to the collection.
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