Review: Magisterium by Jeff Hirsch

 On one side of the Rift is a technological paradise without famine or want. On the other side is a mystery.
Sixteen-year-old Glenn Morgan has lived next to the Rift her entire life and has no idea of what might be on the other side of it. Glenn's only friend, Kevin, insists the fence holds back a world of monsters and witchcraft, but magic isn't for Glenn. She has enough problems with reality: Glenn's mother disappeared when she was six, and soon after, she lost her scientist father to his all-consuming work on the mysterious Project. Glenn buries herself in her studies and dreams about the day she can escape. But when her father's work leads to his arrest, he gives Glenn a simple metal bracelet that will send Glenn and Kevin on the run---with only one place to go.

This is the first book by Jeff Hirsch I’ve read and I’ve got to say I enjoyed it. The dystopian world of Magisterium/Collequim was very interesting to read about and seemed quite real with the science background going on. The beginning reeled me in to keep reading-one thing I love about books-however, the main character Glenn kept me iffy about how I felt about the novel. To me, even though she considered herself a scientist, she came off as not willing to accept things and not wanting to learn more about new happenings around her. Also, she did a lot of dumb things like going back to enemy territory because she thought talking things out would make everything better. Yeah. However, there were some of moments when I truly found her a likeable character and cheered her on.

Her best friend Kevin was my favorite character because he knew what he wanted and went after it. Plus, he was hot and swoon worthy.  I loved reading about the magical (or affinity carrying) creatures because they weren’t you’re average story book people. I wish there would’ve been more talk about the evil Magistra and what had happened in the past to Magisterium because what the author did talk about, made the book sound even more action filled. Speaking of action, there was a whole bunch of it in this book. There was regular hand to hand/sword to sword combat and there was also affinity to affinity combat with which magic occurred.

Overall I would say the only thing I didn’t like about this book was Glenn and that kind of lowered the rating of this book for me. Other than that, I enjoyed the magic filled dystopian that Hirsch created. 3.5 Stars!

Release Date: October 1st, 2012

 *Received from publisher in exchange for honest review