A long time ago when I was tweenish, I loved this series. I know it won't survive a re-read, so I'm noting it and letting it go.

I first read this when I was in high school and I somehow only retained the funny puns and unique world building and forgot the heaps of extraordinary sexism and sexual creepiness these books contained. I need to cleanse my mind with Discworld. ( )

The third installment in Piers Anthony’s Xanth series. We meet the son of the previous main characters, Bink and Chameleon. Dor is a young boy of twelve who has magic and is being raised to someday be King. Most heroes of Xanth have to go on quests and Dor must as well. With his “babysitter”, an ex gargoyle, and a spell from the wizard Humphreys he goes back hundreds of years in time to find a cure for a girl and her zombie.

I find over the years I like series that are family sagas. Probably why I like genealogy as well. I really like the Xanth books for the magic and the humor. I had started this book 2 other times and then lost the book because we moved. The start of the story never left my mind which is rare for me to remember anything I have read for very long. I was happy to finally get to finish and find out how Dor’s first quest went.

Dor's quest seems fairly hard for a 12-year-old but he finds friends and helpers. One friend in a spider he calls Jumper. I mention this because if you are not a friend of spiders you may not like this story as he is in the book for most of it. I don’t love spiders and I don’t hate them either. Jumper was much nicer than Aragog from the Harry Potter series.

I can’t wait to read the next book, Centaur Aisle. I have also read other series from Piers Anthony and I do recommend his books for fantasy lovers. ( )

The Xanth books by Piers Anthony were one of the first SciFi/Fantasy series I ever read. I love puns so I have always enjoyed them. Upon re-reading them I can see that they have some weaknesses but overall they stand the test of time. They are a fun and fast read that keeps me amused without any deep thinking required. ( )

FROM AMAZON: Millie had been a ghost for 800 years. But now, restored by the magic of Xanth, she was again a maddeningly desirable woman. She could have had any man she wanted . . . except the one she did want, Jonathan the zombie. To grant Millie her desire, and to prove his right to rule Xanth in the future, young Magician Dor embarked on a quest for the elixir which would restore Jonathan to full life.

But the potion could be found only in the past . . . so, through a magic tapestry, to the past he went, taking over the body of a barbarian warrior. The first person he encountered there was Jumper, a giant spider—a nightmare monster, but a staunch friend and much-needed ally in peril-haunted, ancient Xanth.

Then Dor met Millie—800 years younger, but just as lovely. And he realized that, in his new body, he was no longer twelve years old . .