The Alchemyst

March 5, 2007
Twin 15-year-old siblings Sophie and Josh Newman take summer jobs in San Francisco across the street from one another: she at a coffee shop, he at a bookstore owned by Nick and Perry Fleming. In the vey first chapter, armed goons garbed in black with "dead-looking skin and... marble eyes" (actually Golems) storm the bookshop, take Perry hostage and swipe a rare Book (but not before Josh snatches its two most important pages). The stolen volume is the Codex, an ancient text of magical wisdom. Nick Fleming is really Nicholas Flamel, the 14th-century alchemist who could turn base metal into gold, and make a potion that ensures immortality. Sophie and Josh learn that they are mentioned in the Codex's prophecies: "The two that are one will come either to save or to destroy the world." Mayhem ensues, as Irish author Scott draws on a wide knowledge of world mythology to stage a battle between the Dark Elders and their hired gun—Dr. John Dee—against the forces of good, led by Flamel and the twins (Sophie's powers are "awakened" by the goddess Hekate, who'd been living in an elaborate treehouse north of San Francisco). Not only do they need the Codex back to stop Dee and company, but the immortality potion must be brewed afresh every month. Time is running out, literally, for the Flamels. Proceeding at a breakneck pace, and populated by the likes of werewolves and vampires, the novel ends on a precipice, presumably to be picked up in volume two. Ages 12-up.

May 15, 2023
A graphic adaptation of the series opener carries humani twins Sophie and Josh into their first encounters with magic plus hordes of mythological and undead beings and creatures. Events follow the general course of those in the original, and Andelfinger preserves enough of the significant dialogue to capture the flavor of Scott's language--but that's not enough to rescue this reworking. Lacking captions to smooth transitions or explain what's happening, the visuals just string together scenes in which the pacing turns herky-jerky and talky banter or explication overflows up or sideways into adjacent panels in often hard-to-follow sequences. Dialogue balloons throughout point to characters who are sometimes depicted with closed mouths and wooden features and also frequently shown as (non)talking heads or just standing around with arms hanging loosely, reacting in overly exaggerated ways, or posed with cocked hips like flirtatious fashion models. The magic that Flamel and John Dee hurl at each other in the opening duel looks (and sounds: "Hiss!" "Pop!" "Zzzzk!") like sprays of effervescent, colored mist. That battle, like the later ones with cat goddess Bastet's minions and Dee's army of zombies, are tableaux with neither visual coherence nor any sense of flow. Some characters, such as the goth teen/immortal warrior Scathach and regal Hekate (the only person of color in the cast), do look suitably powerful, but overall, this whole episode has the look and feel of a stiff walk-through. A drab, mechanical remake. (Graphic fantasy. 12-14)

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