Steeleye and the Lost Magic

by Jason Kingsley, Jon Davis (Illustrator)

60 pages, Hardcover

First published January 29, 1987

Reviews

[Mark Hems]

Loved this book as a kid and though it's long since disappeared from my physical collection I wanted to add it to my online collection to treasure the memory.

[Adrian · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Young warrior!" croaks the Grey Raven. "You may be that Hero who will help to free our land from evil and give it life! Solve the clues that are scattered through the forest. They will contain a secret message, and you must tell me what it is. Without it, I can never hope to find the one creature in the world who could restore our dying valley with his magic lore."

A rather fun charity shop find which Tania picked up on Friday. I read a lot of choose your own adventure books in my childhood but I've never seen one published by Ladybird before.

It is a full on fantasy adventure as you must follow the clues to save a magic kingdom. There are riddles, cryptic clues, and other puzzles to solve as you work you way through.

On the first playthrough, it seems that you can be exited from the kingdom without completing the quest. I found that rather frustrating; I think I'd have rather been killed by a gruesome monster rather than just leaving unvictorious.

I will have to try this again to discover the true finale, but that will have to wait for now as I have far too much to read. 3 1/4 stars

[Charles]

It's kind of difficult to follow and I think if I was making a game book I would give the player different choices than 'Go left or go right' constantly, but the illustrations more than make up for that and I like the writing style overall.