The Return of the Arinn by Frank P Ryan (The Three Powers: Book 4)

7/10

The type of story the author tells is a difficult one for this modern age, not because it deals with current day themes, (although it does do this), but that the idea of 4 kids from Earth having adventures in another, ‘magical’ and more spiritual world sounds a little old fashioned. But Tir is a long way from Narnia.

Ryan uses non-stop action and mature themes to draw us in. He doesn’t stay in the magical world; he also takes a gritty look at what might happen if the darker powers of the magical setting were to invade our own world. He has a style that is easy to read and has created very interesting characters and races to people his alternate world, not all of them human or even humanoid.

In book three, Ryan had introduced 2 new POV characters (Penny and Gully), in book four they seemed to be more interesting than the original 4 kids that started the whole series off (Alan, Kate, Mark and Mo), there could have been a whole other story on Penny alone. This would be my only criticism, only it isn’t really as I enjoyed reading about Penny. It is just that after all that Kate went through in the previous book she then took too much of a ‘back seat’ in this one. This was probably so that Mo’s story could reach its finale. Also some might like more tension in the final ‘showdown’ between Mo and The Tyrant (the main antagonist).

The way that Ryan comes to the end of this story is somewhat surprising; it isn’t the easy way, of making it all seem like a dream or a change of time line to make it so that nothing happened anyway. In other words the characters aren’t reset, they are alive but have to live with all that they have been through.

Overall I have enjoyed the series and I am glad that I had the opportunity to read and review them.

I give this particular book 7 out of 10.  The series as a whole I would give an 8.5 out of 10.