Delivered into the power of the masters of Roydsal, the Spetch twins, Jewel and Thorn set out to track down and retrieve the brass key. Failure will mean the certain death of Thorn's sister Haw.
Before Thorn can leave the house, Racky Jagger shocks him with a bolt from the blue. Then, on Roydsal Dam, disaster strikes the travellers, and they are carried to an island controlled by an unpredictable pair of Syb-sisters.
As adventure follows adventure, Thorn finds uses for the curious gifts he received from the Norgreen Syb. Jewel's strength as a Magian grows, and she comes across a crystal similar to the one stolen and hidden away by Thorn. It contains a dark power - but is there danger in it too?
There are new friends for Jewel and Thorn as well as surprise enemies. And slowly, out of the shadows, moves an opponent more formidable than any they've yet encountered.
Reviews of The Brass Key
"The characters and locations are described in detail and the quest is well-plotted, with successes and setbacks alternating to sustain narrative pace... This is a well-written and richly imagined example of a popular genre."
Sandra Bennett in The School Librarian
Luke Slater at Write Away!:
"...quality dark fantasy adventure for the teenage reader."
Read the online review at Write Away!
In the Bradford Telegraph and Argus, David Barnett writes:
"At more than 400 pages the book is chock-full of adventure... The future society is well-thought out and his characterisation is spot on, with two highly-sympathetic characters in Jewel and Thorn and some well-rounded supplementary figures they meet on their travels...
"Doubtless, Richard Poole has already won a huge number of fans with Jewel and Thorn and The Brass Key should keep them more than happy while cementing his reputation as a top-notch author of young adult fantasy."
"The temptation for the critic when faced with a novel like this, with its teenage heroes and characters only six inches high, is to see it simply as a children's story. Yet the motives - the mystery of Thorn's true father, for instance - and the body count, suggest that its true readership is 'young adult' upwards. Science fiction and fantasy have taken over the roles of the epic and the allegory; they offer strange voyages and moral choices in place of the shopping and sex of chicklit and the ambiguities of literature proper. The Brass Key is for all ages."
Sally Roberts Jones in Planet 179
"... an action-packed fantasy for the 10s-plus... Exciting stuff."
Newbury Weekly News
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Buy signed copies of The Brass Key from Goldsboro Books
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