I suspect this will be a surprise to a lot of you, but reviewing books is not my day job, and this week I’m ramping up to the busiest weekend of my life. Therefore, I’ve decided to review old favorites this week — books I don’t need to reread in order to review. Rest assured that I have read these books, many times each, but don’t be surprised if they all get incredibly high ratings.

I’ll kick off this week with probably the oldest favorite, Tamora Pierce’s first novel. I first read this book back, I think, just before sixth grade (which would have been around 1993) because I wasn’t quite sure what an ‘Alanna’ was. I read that book probably three or four times before I realized it was the first book in a series. Naturally, I caught up quickly.

In a pseudo-medieval country (with magic) called Tortall, Alanna of Trebond is ten, and has a twin brother, Thom. He is to be sent off to the capital to be trained as a knight; she is to be sent north to be trained as a lady in a convent. The problem is, of course, that Alanna is a total tomboy and has no desire, ever, to be a proper lady, and that Thom has a lot of magical talent and really doesn’t want to be a knight. The obvious solution? They switch places. It’s not that easy, of course; she has to hide the fact that she’s a girl. Alanna, or ‘Alan’ as she is called now, realizes that she has to work twice as hard to accomplish things; she’s also short and skinny. And let’s not forget the later problems that come with being a girl — imagine binding your breasts and fencing all day long. Yeah.

Yeah, of course, there’s a good deal of fantasy going on in this book. There aren’t that many females who can pass as males. Alanna has red hair and purple eyes, as does Thom, and how many people in nature have that combination? That’s not even going into the real ‘fantasy’ aspect of the novel, which is the magic. Pierce calls it ‘the Gift’; Thom has a lot of it, and Alanna really isn’t that far behind him. She’s been taught the basics by the wisewoman in her home fief, and she’s exceptionally good at healing. She hides her Gift from the people at the castle in the capital (Corus) until the crown prince, a friend of Alanna’s, falls ill.

Alanna’s training is detailed and methodical. She tries, she fails, she reevaluates things, and she tries again. She’s incredibly stubborn, and that’s nearly the only way she can survive this all-male, physical, and rough world. Not everyone likes her; she makes an enemy right away, and that causes problems for nearly the whole book. As a character, she’s great; yeah, a bit unrealistic, but it’s not as if being an incredible athlete at that high a level comes naturally to her. The other characters are also fun; probably my favorite, as well as everyone else’s, is George Cooper, the King of the Thieves. There’s a wonderful underworld among the peasants in the town, and Alanna and her friends interact with them secretly.

Alanna’s world is also detailed, logical, and well-described. Although it’s generally medieval, the hierarchy of nobles is well-explained. Every aspect with which Alanna interacts makes so much sense. There is a lot in these books to appeal to the tween reader, but the books also hold more than just a nostalgic appeal to older readers. The sequels expand her story and involve more romance, more danger, and more magic. Book 1 is not just a book to skim through to get to the later volumes, though — it’s a good adventure itself.

Pierce has said before that she did very little specific research for this book; she’d been reading history and genre works for years, and just had all that knowledge in her head. She also said she wanted to write a book about a girl knight, because she always wanted to read one. Well, at age ten or eleven, I always wanted to read one: I just didn’t know it yet. In so many ways, this book set the standard for all my early loves in the fantasy world. It’s not a perfect book, but I certainly thought it was when I was ten. I can’t give it anything but 5/5 stars, and recommend it heartily for all readers, especially 10-14-year-old girls.