Bloodboar the Buried Doom

Beast Quest #48

by Adam Blade

The final book in a brand new series featuring fabulous adventures for Tom and his companions! Great for boys, with a huge collectability factor bolstered by the collectors' cards in the back of the books, and links to an excellent interactive website. Sanpao the Pirate King has sent Bloodboar the Buried Doom to tear Avantia's capital city apart! Tom must destroy the Beast, find the Tree of Being and defeat Sanpao. If he fails he will never see his mother again. Has Tom finally met his match?

Genres: Fantasy, Childrens

121 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2011

About the author

Adam Blade is the house name for the Working Partners Ltd. ghostwriters who write the Beast Quest and Sea Quest series.

Adam Blade is in his late twenties, and was born in Kent, England. His parents were both history teachers and amateur artists, and Adam grew up surrounded by his father’s paintings of historic English battles – which left a lifelong mark on his imagination. He was also fascinated by the ancient sword and shield that hung in his father’s office. Adam’s father said they were a Blade family heirloom.

As a boy, Adam would spend days imagining who could have first owned the sword and shield. Eventually, he created a character – Tom, the bravest boy warrior of them all. The idea for Beast Quest was born.

When Adam grew up and decided that he wanted to be a writer, he was stuck for ideas – until he remembered the old sword and shield, and the imaginary boy he had created when he was young. Adam decided to bring Tom fully to life so that readers could go on the kind of adventures that he always wanted to when he was that age… And still does, even though he’s grown up!

When he’s not writing Beast Quest books, Adam enjoys visiting museums and ancient battle sites. His main hobbies are fencing and football. He also spends a lot of time at home running around after his two exotic pets – a tarantula named Ziggy, and a capuchin monkey named Omar. These little rascals were the inspiration for two of the Beasts that Tom faces on his Quest – Arachnid and Claw.

Sadly, Adam does not have his own Fire-Dragon or Horse-Man. But he really wishes he did!

Reviews

[HeWhoWalksBehindTheRows]

Hyfsad avslut på historien om den elaka Piratkungen Sanpao. Min son satt som på nålar under uppgörelsen. Det är bra betyg nog för mig.

[Zeerin Star]

They'd been doing so well. The ghostwriters seemed to finally get their shit together. There were minimal amounts of continuity errors and typos, though some of those typos got kind of egregious, like when in one of the books they said that the amber jewel in Tom's Belt allowed the wielder to communicate with Beasts even though that's what the red jewel does. The amber jewel gives increased fighting prowess. But then they ruined it for themselves with this one. First they say that Tom's mother, Freya, is trapped in Gwildor even though she's trapped in Tavania and then Tom throws his shield only for it to come back to him like a damn boomerang, even though that that's not how his shield works. This book also has quite a few typos (Avantain and sheild to name a couple).The villain of this set, Sanpao, has had Tom's Belt ever since the first book of the set, Balisk, and used the amber jewel, the one that gives increased fighting prowess, in an earlier fight against Tom and was easily winning the encounter; however, in the final confrontation between Tom and Sanpao, Sanpao apparently forgets all about the amber jewel's power and lets his ass get handed to him by Tom. Oh, and somehow King Hugo knows the name of Elenna's new horse despite her only just getting it in this set and them not having been back to King Hugo's palace since the start of the set. Tom got a token from the previous book's Beast, an eye that apparently gives a glimpse into the future. But we know that that's not what the eye does. Every token that had come specifically from a Beast's body (as opposed to the Gwildorian talismans or the jewels from the Gorgonian Beasts) and which we've seen the associated power of has had a power related to that Beast. Ferno's scale gives fire resistance, Nanook's bell cold. Sepron's tooth gives the ability to breathe underwater, which, by the way, in this set the ghostwriters finally remembered that that's how Sepron's tooth works. Balisk's fang was an outlier because it was a boomerang and Balisk's power seemed to be splitting into air and sea versions of itself, but it's a perfectly acceptable exception because we don't see Balisk using an associated power with it's tooth. It was just a tooth; it used it to bite things. But the second Beasts claw was some sort of poison, as related to the poisonous stinger it had, the third Beast literally just gave a weapon. The trident Tom got from the third Beast of the set was literally *just* a trident. It had no special powers, Tom just used it as an anchoring tool. The fourth Beast was another dragon, similar to Ferno, but with the power of breathing very hot, very strong gusts instead of outright fire. And the Beast's scale gave off tremendous amounts of heat. The final Beast, the one from this book, gave a star-shaped piece bone. Similar to the trident it had no special powers; Tom used it as a throwing star. But it fits because the Beast didn't have any special powers. It was just tough and smart, with a bony carapace over it's upper body. But the fifth Beast, the one the eye came from, had a very specific thing it did with it's eyes: it shot tricking lasers out of them. Which means that the eye it gave as a token, by all rules so far shown from the Beast tokens, should have *also* shot lasers.
But the thing that really brings this book down to two stars is that in every previous book of this set one of the Beasts either helped Tom or was mentioned. Sepron, Tagus, Epos (mentioned but not seen, book took place in vicinity of her territory. Literally right next door to it.), Arcta, and Nanook. By all rights this should've been Ferno's book. Instead, Ferno doesn't even get mentioned at all. I even re-read the book in the middle of writing this part of the review to double check, and Ferno's isn't anywhere to be found. It's been firmly established that the Master of Beasts can call Beasts to their side, and even though Tom is the real Master of Beasts in Avantia, his father Taladon is the one with the title. He should've called Ferno to help when the palace was being attacked by Bloodboar, this book's evil Beast. Or Tom should've done it when he and Elenna had gotten back to the palace and we're besieged by pirates on one side and Bloodboar on the other. In fact, I've gotten so worked up while writing this review that I'm lowering my opinion.
1 star because of stupid mistakes that should've been caught in editing, Beast tokens that don't work the way tokens have been established to work, and because one of the Good Beasts of Avantia was completely ignored.

[Janna]

I was slightly annoyed by this one as it seemed to be set up for Taladon to be bewitched too, but he wasn't so certain things didn't make sense. Why would he tell Elenna to let Tom try to fight the beast himself, when he obviously couldn't, and two seconds later she swoops in to save him anyway?

[Laura]

I enjoyed this mini-series, it was a refreshing change having the Pirates instead of the usual dark wizard. I liked all the times Tom and Elenna played tricks on the Pirates and outwitted them. I wonder if that's the last we've seen of them...

[Khurram]

The action packed conclusion to the action packed series 8 of Beast Quest. Here Tom and Ellana face a beast is as intelligent as it is powerful. Also the must deal with the evil pirate Sanpao and his crew. For once they might have some help on that front, as well as a bit of lord of the rings awakening. This is a very good conclusion to the series 8 but also builds on for later.