Shasta, a northerner living as a slave in a foreign household, escapes
back to the northern lands near Narnia with a talking horse and some
other friends. As usual, Lewis’ prose is breathtakingly good. His
allegorical Eastern land and its people are superb. And he delicately
balances the line between high fantasy and humorous children’s fantasy
with masterful skill.
But there’s a gaping plot point: when
Shasta is mistaken for a prince, surely his clothes couldn’t have
matched the real prince’s. Also, although Aslan is handled with a gentle
touch through most of the book, he appears himself to mete out justice
at the end, which I find a bit much. Especially since the plot had been
set up for a perfect ending: the prince who attacks the northern lands
had been officially condemned by his father, and one of the runaways
overheard that conversation. This would be enough to shame him; but no,
Aslan has to magically fix it forever. Ho-hum. The criticism I had in my
review of The Silver Chair holds: no self-determination = little drama.
three stars
