'As Leo and his friends learn more about the origins of their unusual gifts—and the daunting destiny that awaits them—they start training to prepare for the great battle coming their way. But there is still one key person missing, and the gang will try its hardest to track down the remaining wizard so that the Magic 6 can finally become the Magic 7.'
The Magic 7 finally come together in the third volume of the series, in a book that feels like a cross between a mystery story and a super-hero adventure.
The third volume opens with the newly gather six teens, with the recent addition of Milo, training with their powers for the fight that they've been told is coming. Farah has taken to her new role as a flying sorcerer, having redesigned the armour that Alice gave her to better reflect her style and personality. Lupe has been preparing a new batch of mech-armour for the group to wear into battle, whilst also creating a new high-tech hideout for them. Milo has been learning to use his powers for the better, using them to keep adults from discovering their group. Hamelin has learnt to use his animal communication powers to direct his troops from the sideline. And Alice is working out the best path to discovering who the final mage is.
During all this Leo has been meeting with his father, who he learnt was still alive at the end of the previous volume. Nathaniel reveals some of the origin of the Magic 7 and their powers to Leo, as well as the reader. We learn that the child of an angel and a demon was born with incredible abilities, but passed each one of them on to one of their seven followers. These powers were used to banish a powerful, evil entity from the world. An entity that will be returning soon.
Whist dealing with all this pressure Alice informs the group that they've already met their final member, and that they need to search them out. Thus begins a mission to find a creative individual who could have the power of the enchanter. Sadly, their quest throws up several possible individuals, and when strange monsters start appearing around town their time to find a solutions begins to run out.
This might be my favourite volume of the series yet. I really like how things slowed down a bit and we got a chance to hang out with the various members of the group and their peers as they tried to figure out who the enchanter is. The book presented several candidates, and I thought that I'd figured it out at one point, yet the story managed to fool me, and I didn't see that particular revelation coming.
The reveal also came with what I found to be an incredibly interesting and pretty dark piece of backstory too. We learn that the enchanter, who has the ability to bring any of their drawings to life, had a baby sister. Their sister died as a baby when they were young. The enchanter was alone with them at the time, drawing whilst the baby was asleep. The baby girl died in her sleep and their parents told them that they could never draw again. They tell Leo that they were drawing a fairy at the time. Now, this could be just a simple tragic event, a baby passing away, which would be devastating enough, but I also read it as the fairy having become real and killing the sister. If that's true, this character has an awful, shocking backstory that is sure to lead to some serious trauma.
I wasn't expecting this kind of revelation from this series, and whilst it was shocking to read it really didn't feel massively out of place. This series seems to be building towards something, a big threat that's coming and could cause the destruction of everything. This isn't an unusual kind of plot-point for a children's fantasy series, but now it feels like the series could have some real stakes to it. Just having the inclusion of this piece of backstory, of a baby possibly having died because of these powers, makes me suddenly feel like these characters aren't going to be guaranteed to be safe. Death has become part of this narrative, and a possibility for our heroes and their loved ones.
The book also lead me to become super suspicious of Nathaniel come the end. Nathaniel is meeting with Leo in secret, telling him about the history of the Magic 7, which isn't too bad, but him also meeting with Alice, trying to get her to admit her powers and being shady about who he is feels pretty dodgy to me. He seems to have his own agenda going on, and is definitely not telling the kids everything. By the end of the book Leo has gone to spend the summer with his father, and boy does Nathaniel's expression look shifty. I could be totally wrong, but I'm waiting for him to have his own scheme to be be a villain in later volumes.
The art team, Rosa La Barbera, Giuseppe Quattrocchi on art and Francesca Mengozzi and Giovanni Marcora on colours, seem to be having a lot of fun with this volume too. We get more of Lupe's mecha creations with battle suits and the transforming train car headquarters, but we get some monsters too! There are some fantastic little creatures running round the town, one of which features on the cover, that look absolutely fantastic, and a giant Godzilla-like kaiju that starts tearing up the city. It's the most action packed volume of the book yet, and it's never looked better. Everything looks bright and bold, the drawings are dynamic and full of energy, and the colours are bright and wonderful.
I feel like a bit of a broken record saying that 'this is the best volume yet' at the end of each of these reviews, but this really is a series that's getting better as it goes on. I'm three books in and I'll admit, I'm kind of hooked. I want to find out what happens next, I like the characters, and reading these books is never a chore.
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