EREC REX

Erec (think Harry), “a normal boy with a few minor exceptions,” spends most of his second outing in the magical land of Alypium angry at King Piter (think Dumbledore) and others for refusing to reveal his real identity and parentage. This does not stop him from completing two more of the 12 Tasks required to win the Kingship, preventing evil sorcerer Baskania from harvesting the eyes of a generation of dragonlings, saving a town of nonhuman Vogum from a pogrom (very thinly disguised, there’s even a reference to a Protocols of the Elders of Vogum), again making a trio of bullies look ridiculous and himself acquiring a second dragon’s eye to go with the one he was given in the first episode. Though Kingsley crafts a distractingly choppy, episodic plot with some familiar elements, it’s buoyed up by unusually clever details—paper mail delivered by snails, for instance, and a magic toilet dubbed Al’s Well into which Erec has to reach to receive his Tasks. That, along with a notably quirky supporting cast and plenty of heroic behavior, combines to carry readers through. (Fantasy. 11-13)