The High Lord: The Black Magician Trilogy

By Trudi Canavan

"You want to know the truth."

Sonea has learned much since she was but a penniless urchin possessing an awesome untapped ability. She has earned the grudging respect of her fellow novices and a place in the Magicians' Guild. But there is much she wishes she had never learned—what she witnessed, for example, in the underground chamber of the mysterious High Lord Akkarin . . . and the knowledge that the Guild is being observed closely by an ancient fearsome enemy.

Still, she dares not ignore the terrifying truths the High Lord would share with her, even though she fears it may be base trickery, a scheme to use her astonishing powers to accomplish his dark aims. For Sonea knows her future is in his hands—and that only in the shadows will she achieve true greatness . . . if she survives.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Oct 13, 2009
• ISBN: 9780061798191

Trudi Canavan

Trudi Canavan is the author of the bestselling Black Magician trilogy—The Magician's Guild, The Novice, and The High Lord—as well as Priestess of the White and Last of the Wilds, Books One and Two of her Age of the Five trilogy. She lives in a little house on a hillside, near a forest, in the Melbourne suburb of Ferntree Gully in Australia. She has been making up stories about things that don't exist for as long as she can remember, and was amazed when her first published story received an Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Short Story in 1999. A freelance illustrator and designer, she also works as the designer and Art Director of Aurealis, a magazine of Australian Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Reviews for The High Lord

[guinevereanne · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorites

[cingo-2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I realy liked it.

[brakketh-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Satisfying and enjoyable conclusion to the Black Magician Trilogy. Sonea is vindicated and some societal change occurs.

[ellsie98 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A disappointing finish to what had promised to be an epic finale.

Each point of view only followed two people, and although the first half was fantastic, the last few chapters failed to make me feel any sympathy for the main characters as they and those they loved died.

I remain convinced of the gay romance between Akkarin and Lorlen, in spite of the events of this book making it impossible :(

All in all, a good read, but the cast and plot was not quite as definitive or complex as I would have liked.

[ferrisscottr · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Last book in the trilogy.

Couldn't put this book down - it had it all, great characters that I cared about, fast moving plot that kept me riveted, the writing was great.

So why not 5 stars?
Portions of the ending I did not care for.
And
I did have an issue with the pacing.
It seemed like we had 2.5 books dedicated to one story and then all of a sudden half way through the third book in the story the whole focus changed (I won't go into further detail lest spoilers emerge)...then it seemed like there was a whole new story that could have been another trilogy but it was packed into half a book and seemed way way way too rushed.
So because this way a huge issue for me....we'll make it a 4 star review.

But
The book was great, the trilogy was great, highly recommended and I definitely will be reading more Trudi Canavan in the near future.

[newskepticx · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Things I liked about this series:
- engaging
- interesting magic system
- clever
- fairly well-written

Things I did not:
- weird pacing
- Sonea's relationship...at least it bucks YA trends and it's not Regin
- cohesiveness of the trilogy

[nakmeister · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A good solid conclusion to Trudi Canavan's Black Magician Trilogy. It's the first fantasy series I've read in many years and it is a good (re)introduction to the genre. It's not epic in scope like many of my favourite fantasy series, but it's an enjoyable book.

[rincewind1986 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very solid end to a fantastic trilogy, all three books are well writen and well devised. Sonea is a character that it is impossible not to fall in lve with and all the other characters are just as strong. If you like fantasy novels then the black magicians trilogy is a must read. The story is fantastic and you cant help but read 'just one more page'. i infact read all 3 books in 2 days, and then spent months waiting for the trudi Canavan book to be released. I would give it 5 stars but that is reserved for Lord Of The Rings.

[gimble_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The conclusion of the Magicians series of books keeps you hanging on to the the very end, then sort of founders for a good ending. This book makes use of the earlier characters one did not see much of in "The Novice" which made the story more interesting. Instead of tying everything up in this book I feel that more books in the series would have helped to clean up the dangling sub stories in the book.

[bonne_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Not as polished as it could be...

[eatworm_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I loved this book. Definitely the best book of the series. There are some slow points to the first two books, but this one really picks up. Characters, dialogue, plot - all great. There were some characters that I wished had less focus, and the two main ones (Sonea and Akkarin) more focus, however. I really got drawn into this book and was very fond of Sonea and Akkarin. For this reason, perhaps, I found the ending very short and sudden - a failing of a lot of authors! I think more time should have been spent here. After reading three books to get to the finale personally I think the author should really reward her audience with more than a couple of pages to finish!

[kale.dyer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Satisfying and enjoyable conclusion to the Black Magician Trilogy. Sonea is vindicated and some societal change occurs.

[judithproctor · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Although I enjoyed reading this, I felt some parts were very contrived. Characters seem to need excuses to not communicate (like removing a blood ring) in order for the plot to continue with other characters acting without full knowledge of what is happening.I worked out how they could use the people in the slums long before Sonea did. Akharrian should have worked it out too.I do find it frustrating when characters have an attack of the stupid, whether they're the good guys or the bad - and both happen in this book. (I won't kill you now, I'll let you see your friends suffer.) (Exile him - we'll find out later if he's speaking the truth...)

[amanda3richards · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I just, I can't even talk about it right now...

The ending had me in full on disgusting ugly cry mode and I couldn't control it. Do you know how difficult it is to read when your eyes are spewing tears? Pretty darn hard.

The writing was amazing, the story was action packed and addicting from chapter one until the end. There were a few characters who I wish had done more. One in-particular...

But overall, this is definitely going on my re-read shelf. And now I have to go purchase the other few books in the other series'.

[shanaqui_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It wasn't that complicated a plot, or that original a premise -- to be honest, much of the setting reminded me of Raymond E. Feist's Krondor mixed with his magicians on Kelewan. Regardless, I enjoyed reading the books and read them very quickly: one a day, just about. They're light, easy reads, in my opinion. If you're looking for something long and epic, look somewhere else, but if you want something to take up a boring weekend or something, I think these books would do it nicely.

The action itself definitely had me on edge. About one hundred and fifty pages from the end, I was literally on the edge of my seat bouncing up and down! The parts about the slums, wherever they came in, were perhaps a little too long. In the last part, that drew out the tension almost more than I could stand.

I liked the characters a lot. They were quite simply drawn, when I think about it -- Akkarin, for example, despite being a major character, got barely any characterisation at all until partway through the last book of the trilogy. Rothen was, purely and simply, a good father figure. Simple doesn't mean bad, though -- they were easy to like (or dislike, in Regin's case), and I got very fond of Sonea, Cery, Dannyl and Rothen in particular.

The relationships were... okay. Characters seemed to form relationships in the blink of an eye, and loathing turned to love very, very fast. The only relationship that I felt was really built up carefully was the one between Dannyl (a male magician) and Tayend (a male scholar). I enjoyed that aspect of the books quite a lot, actually, and while the relationship doesn't serve any particular plot purpose, I think it justifies its own existence as much as a het couple would. I read bits of Trudi Canavan's site and she said that she knew from the start that Dannyl was gay. When it came time for him to go on a quest and discover things, she wanted to spice up his subplot, and that came with a romance. And Tayend. I thought that relationship was really sweet, and it didn't fill me with rage as homosexuality as portrayed in fantasy has in the past -- I remember a series of books I read years ago where you could tell who the bad guys were because they were all gay sadists who tended to rape guys who fell into their hands!

Like I said: I think the trilogy's really quite an easy read. It doesn't have that much depth -- but as a casual read, I loved it.

[krumbs_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A good resolution to the trilogy. There was some unnecessary geographic shuffling of the characters, I thought, but the excitement and drama was well done.

I'm glad she's picked up this world again in a second trilogy; looking forward to seeing the aftermath of this story.

[champak256 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a good book with action, conflict, and a good plot, but I found the characters hard to sympathise with and some of the dialogue was boring.

[lithicbee · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I actually enjoyed the third book in the Black Magician trilogy more than the first two. Luckily, the mystery of the High Lord that ran through the other two books was enough to keep me reading through to the third. There was more action in this one, and the main character, Sonea, comes into her own. I would be hard pressed to recommend this series based on the final book, but if you have read the first one, I would recommend getting through the second so that you can enjoy the final one.

[ansate · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Went in different directions than I was expecting, which is a neat trick to pull off in a trilogy, but I found the ending dissatisfying verging on annoying.

[redthing · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Book three is probably at the top of my favorite book list. But did she really have to pair Sonea and Akkarin? It just seems like he is more of a father figure, and that pairing just seemed out of place. Anywho, a great conclusion to one of my favorite series!

[fabulousandfeminist · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting, powerful, very strong messages

[inserttitlehere · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ok. This book... ok, well I loved the series. And I adored this novel until about 5/6 of the way through it. I absolutely do not approve of the ending for this series. For one thing, the romance happened way too fast (although it was still a nice touch, maybe if it were drawn out and felt less like it was an afterthought), and another... well i'm not going to ruin the ending, but let's just say i almost threw the book across the room (which, of course, i didn't do since i treat my books very well). So be prepared, it's a great series till the end. recommended, just be on your guard... i've given you fair warning.

[rainmountain · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In this book it really gets interesting.Not so much Clichee like in the first bookand some interesting, unexpected twists and turns in the story.Again, if you love fantasy, you will love this Trilogy.***** out of 5

[reading_fox · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The trilogy comes to a climatic conclusion. Sonea having finally put to rest the novices taunting, settles into her studies. Her new guardian Akkarin the High Lord is no longer theforbidding figure he once was, and assists her with what could be the dull sunjects of guild history and architecture. This is fascinatingly written as we discover that the Guild itself hid a terrible tragedy from its current staff and students. Sonea's intellect starts to question what evil really is - where should her loyalties lie, especiallty considering her kin in the slums that no other Magician would think of helping.Dannyl's research into Akkyn's past continues and here also disturbing secrets are to be found - but how can he find the crucial details without his own secret s being brought out before the conservative Guild. The concluding half of the book is a fascinating discription of the invasion and how non-magicians can battle those so much more powerul than themselves. Well written but at times lacking in emotion - the depth of feeling is never quite witht eh characters even in their most bitter moments. The annoying creaures names are also back in force though for some reason horses have managed to remain un-altered. Not as impressive as the Novice it is still an enjoyable read with a gripping conclusion.

[stnylan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

And sure enough, the storm breaks. This book is very much a novel of two parts. The first part continues somewhat with the pace of the second. But then about half way through the gears change and all bets are off. A very enjoyable read, a little pat at times but entertaining for all that.

[wyvernfriend · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Not as good as the other two, this one seemed to have some very contrived situations happening and a leadup to a sequel or two.Good but a bit disappointing.

[joybee_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A great end to the series. Cery is back in this book, and the story shifts from him, to Sonea. As Sonea learns more about the High Lord she begins to trust him. There is a threat to the guild that the High Lord has been keeping at bay and once he is no longer part of the guild war begins. Can the guild survive? And if they do will they ever be the same?

[clurb · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A nice, well-rounded end to the trilogy. My only real gripes were that I felt one of the secondary plot lines concerning the character Savara was not concluded in any satisfying way, and Sonea's relationship with Akkarin seemed painfully forced and unlikely.

[isamoor_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Jan13:Characters: The high lord just didn't really cut it for me. Main chick was solid though.Plot: Okay except for the ending. Trudi let me down a few times on this bit.Style: High fantasy, but well better than average.

[donram14 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An outstanding conclusion to a trilogy, if I've ever read one. Canavan laces this one with suspense seemingly at every turn, all the whilst answering the questions we've had since Magician's Guild. And, she leaves us with a delightful surprise at the book's very end that's well worth waiting for. Excellent, excellent read for all lovers of the fantasy genre!