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“Lina the Teenage Sorceress” is the sixth book in the Super-Explosive Demon Story series. I have read the previous installment “City of Lost Souls,” but it barely gave me any advantage for understanding the storyline of this newer book. If you really care, there is an overarching storyline concerning Lina’s quest for a magical object, the Orihalcon. But all you really need to know to understand how this series works is that anything that can go wrong in Lina’s life will go wrong. This makes for endless adventures where Lina and her friends fight demons, sorcerors, and even dragons.
In this book Lina and her friends, Gourry the warrior, Zelgaldis the Chimera, and the princess Amelia, try to relax after their recent battles. Unfortunately an encounter with Amelia’s father sets them on a series of encounters and adventures leading up to an epic battle. During these adventures a strange sorcerer, named Xellos, appeared. He is helpful to Lina, but his motives are quite ambiguous and foreboding.
I found the storyline of this particular book to be a little confusing, especially since much of the Slayers material I have seen has been fairly light and lacking in complexity. It would probably be easier to grasp if all of the previous books in this storyline were read first. Otherwise, the humor of the book is as good as ever, playing on Lina’s lack of “development” and Gourry’s lack of intelligence.
The artwork of the book is quite cartoony, and exaggerated for humorous effect. I feel that this is probably the appropriate style for such a book. Particularly since most fantasy based stories are drawn in such a serious fashion. Think about the meticulous “realistic” detail that was given to special effects in the recently released Lord of the Rings movies. Since Slayers is a humorous look at the fantasy genre, a cartoon-like and unrealistic art style is almost completely necessary to invoke the proper response to such a parody.
This is probably not the quintessential Slayers release, but it does in a pinch. For fans of the series, this will be a necessary purchase to continue a collection. For those new to the title I recommend finding earlier Slayers books to begin the experience. If you like it, you should begin reading them in a fairly linear fashion. I enjoyed the book, as I have with all other Slayers releases, nut this is probably my least favorite to date. I guess I just need to invest some more time into the series.
-brant-
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