Incarceron & Sapphique by Catherine Fisher

Rating:

Characters: 19/20

Plot: 20/20

Originality: 20/20

Writing: 19/20

Recommendation: 19/20

Overall: 97/100 or A

Source: Borrowed from grandmother/Bought

Incarceron- Incarceron is a prison so vast that it contains not only cells, but also metal forests, dilapidated cities, and vast wilderness. Finn, a seventeen year-old prisoner, has no memory of his childhood and is sure that he came from Outside Incarceron. Very few prisoners believe that there is an Outside, however, which makes escape seem impossible.

And then Finn finds a crystal key that allows him to communicate with a girl named Claudia. She claims to live Outside- she is the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, and doomed to an arranged marriage. Finn is determined to escape the prison, and Claudia believes she can help him. But they don’t realize that there is more to Incarceron than meets the eye. Escape will take their greatest courage and cost more than they know.

Sapphique-The only one who escaped…and the one who could destroy them all.

Incarceron, the living prison, has lost one of its inmates to the outside world: Finn’s escaped, only to find that Outside is not at all what he expected. Used to the technologically advanced, if violently harsh, conditions of the prison, Finn is now forced to obey the rules of Protocol, which require all people to live without technology. To Finn, Outside is just a prison of another kind, especially when Claudia, the daughter of the prison’s warden, declares Finn the lost heir to the throne. When another claimant emerges, both Finn’s and Claudia’s very lives hang on Finn convincing the Court of something that even he doesn’t fully believe.

Meanwhile, Finn’s oathbrother Keiro, and his friend Attia, are still trapped inside Incarceron. They are searching for a magical glove, which legend says Sapphique used to escape. To find it, they must battle the prison itself, because Incarceron needs the glove too.

Review: An amazing series that caused me to devour it in short time. This fantasy is a dark and rich Steampunk that justifies drooling while reading. I enjoyed every second of it and considered the sequel, Sapphique, to be just as marvelous and satisfying as the first. I found the series to be worthy of a double-review, incorporating both first and second novels. My regards go to the author and artist of this masterpiece, Catherine Fisher. Bravo, bravo!