Superior Saturday by Garth Nix

Ever since Arthur Penhaglian recieved the Minute Key from a dying man and been declared the Chosen One, he has been battling the Immortal Trustees of the Will. He has managed to retrieve 5 of the pieces of the will but now he must go after the two strongest Guardians, Superior Saturday, the oldest thing in existence in the Universe, and supreme sorceress of the House. Luckily, she has her attention more on taking over the Incomparable Gardens and dethroning Lord Sunday.

To facilitate her schemes, she has the lower house destroyed by the forces of Nothing, allowing the trees that support the Gardens to stop growing and enabling her to finally come within reach of her longtime foe. And she isn't alone in this. All the sorcerors in the house save Doctor Scamandros serve her, and with their powers added to hers, she is well-nigh invincible.

Arthur, back in his own world after rescuing a load of Patients with his new friend Leaf from Doctor Friday, gets a call from his brother Eric saying that because of the sleepy plague that Doctor Friday initiated, the military is going to deal with it by setting off a bomb at the East Side hospital, and he needs to take clothing, food and supplies into the basement and stay there while the bomb is set off in approximately ten minutes. Arthur frantically tries to get in touch with Doctor Scamandros, but he cannot be found, so he orders his wand to keep the hospital safe, which it does by freezing time around the hospital. He then returns to the lower house just before it is destroyed by the Nothing.

Use of his powers has another side effect, though. It is slowly turning him into a denizen of the house, and the more he uses them, the faster the effect. Arthur is already noticing how his anger and sense of superiority have grown, and he fears he will continue to act like that if he turns into a Denizen. He finds Doctor Scamandros and talks with him, and then has a conversation with the Old One, the God imprisoned in the basement, while fearing he has become too much of a Denizen for the Old One to stomach him. But no, he still thinks of Arthur as a human, and promises to free him if he gets control of the house.

After that, he visits the Will and convinces her to split herself to take care of the two major problems besetting the house. Then, he must travel to the Upper, Upper portion of the House even though Superior Saturday has blocked it off just to prevent him from getting in. But he is helped by the Raised Rats, who, along with the aid of Doctor Scamandros in turning him temporarily into a Rat, send him through a magical bottle into the upper house along with his friend Suzy Blue, a Piper's Child.

There, Arthur will have to search for the Will and get the wand of Saturday from Superior Saturday. But can he do it without becoming a denizen and being stuck in the house forever? Or will the magic turning him into something else- which has made his hair blonde, his eyes brilliant blue, his teeth shiny and perfect and his blood golden be able to be stopped so that he can be just human, as he always was?

This is not really a long book at all, but it packs a lot of punch into its pages. In fact, the story ends on a cliffhanger, so we cannot know if Arthur really won against Superior Saturday or not. Given that the following book, Lord Sunday, will be coming out, I'll hazard a guess that he does.

The stakes keep getting higher, and Arthur wins this one (if he does) by the very skin of his teeth. I want to read that last book and see what happens, and I hope it comes out soon. This is a great series for kids and teens, and even adults as well, with issues of power, abandonment, fear of losing control of your body (Arthur turning into a Denizen, meaning he will have to leave his family behind forever), and even health and friendship.

I recommend this series, which is by the same writer who gave us the wonderful series Sabriel, Liriel, Abhorsen, Garth Nix. Check it out.