In the final book of the trilogy, published 2005, Nathaniel is a senior magician and a member of the ruling council, an elite class of magicians in the government. Bartimaeus is still trapped on Earth by Nathaniel and is treated with disdain, continuously weakening as he is not allowed to return to the Other Place. Meanwhile, Kitty Jones has been hiding undercover and completing her research on magic and spirits. She hopes that this will enable her to break the endless cycles of conflicts between djinn and humans. The main plot of this story is a conspiracy to overthrow the government which causes the most dangerous threat in the history of magic. Together, Nathaniel, Bartimaeus and Kitty try to save the city of London from this dangerous threat. Within the first few sentences my heart sank. Oh no, I thought, fanciful purple prose attempting to set a magical aura about the opening scene. If the quality of a book rested solely on its plot, this would be an excellent novel. The general plot is, of course, standard fantasy fare (save the world!) but its details and the world built to drive it is unique. Also, there appears to be a second plot running under the main one which will obviously be continued in the later books, and this plot seems much more promising. Short-listed for the British Book Awards, 2004; the WH Smith Teen Choice Award (UK) 2004; Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis (German Youth Literature Award) 2005.

If you want an ingenious hybrid of Riordan, Pratchett, and comedic fantasy in general, you now know where to go. In an alternate London where the British Empire dominates the world through control of magic, and commoners are governed by the ruling class of magicians, five-year-old Nathaniel begins an apprenticeship to magician Arthur Underwood, Minister of Internal Affairs.A very interesting and fun read. Bartimaeus is an unforgettable character and very witty. Well done Jonathan Stroud for a well invented young adult, fantasy novel. I ended up enjoying this book more than I thought I would. Bartimaeus reveals to the reader the presence of an endless cycle wherein magicians summon spirits, magicians rule over commoners, spirits spread magic throughout a city, some of the commoners gain a resistance to magic, the commoners rebel against the magicians, the magicians are overthrown and the spirits return to the Other Place until another magical empire rises to dominance. This cycle proves to be the main plot, which culminates in the overthrowing of London. Bartimaeus makes references to other magical empires, such as Baghdad, Rome and Egypt, all of which have fallen from dominance as well. While it bears some resemblance to other narratives of the underdog sorceror's apprentice (Harry Potter leaps to mind), this is different. For while Bartimaeus is to a certain extent an unreliable narrator whose every utterance should not be taken at face value, he does pinpoint the sins, foibles and vanities of the human race and especially of the magical elite, whom he knows intimately from long experience. In this respect, he is similar to C.S. Lewis's demon Screwtape--although Bartimaeus would not care for that particular comparison. Best Books for Young Adults Top Ten List". Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA). 30 July 2007 . Retrieved 18 July 2021.

Stroud's use of footnotes, far from being distracting is actually quite infectious. Bartimaeus, in the manner of a quietly comic George Burns, well aware of his own comedic skills, steps out of character and out of the story in the footnotes, to offer his own sotto voce observations and asides directly to the reading audience. Judiciously sprinkled throughout the novel, Stroud has kept their number and length at exactly the right level to ensure the high-speed plot is not dampened. The Amulet of Samarkand | Awards & Grants". American Library Association. 18 February 2010 . Retrieved 18 July 2021.Not to compare this too much to Harry Potter, but it is one of the first series to ride the initial wave of Pottermania to greater notoriety. This book is very cleverly written, with two alternating strands of narration. One in the third person, tells the story mainly from the point of view of Nathaniel. The other strand gives us a different perspective on the characters and events but it is in the first person, from the point of view of the devious, superior and sarcastic otherworldly being Bartimaeus. There are a lot of fantastic things about this book. Bartimaeus' hilarious footnotes. The witty style of writing. The changes of style that accompany the change in POV from chapter to chapter. Characters that aren't just flat out good or bad, but rather a more mixed bag. "Real" people, in other words, motivated by ambition, or revenge, or greed.