Mirrorshade

Mirrorshade - Bk 3 written and illustrated by Mike Wilks (Egmont)

PB RRP $18.95

ISBN 978-1-4052-5373-4

Reviewed by Anastasia Gonis

In the third book of the trilogy, Mel, Wren and Ludo are jailed in the dungeons of Deep Trouble in the Mirrorscape. They are helped to flee by a girl Wren’s age, and the help of Cogito, the thinking machine. Their mission is to find the mirrortree and obtain its fruit so they can be totally free again. But no one knows of this fruit. What it is exactly is for the children to discover.

Here a parallel story begins. Three bad figments identical to the children have been released. Their intention is to find the real children and destroy them, take their place and obtain freedom from the Mirrorscape forever. But these figments are unknown to Mel and his friends.  It is when the real children start to be hunted because of the theft and destruction that the mirrorshades cause that they find out what they are dealing with.

With the help of their friends Goldie and the invisible Pilfer, they escape firedrakes, giant furry spiders, and stare crows amidst lots of comic confusion that occurs in trying to establish to who is who. There are many lessons to be learned for the three children on their search for freedom and truth. Battles between good and evil are metaphorical and literal. They learn that what they had to find was the knowledge that there is a dark and light side to every person and their mirrorshades reflect the side of themselves that they refused to acknowledge. For them to be whole, ‘they must be united with their dark side’ at some stage of their life. Their experiences bring them to a greater understanding of who they are, and of others.

This series is highly imaginative and well constructed. There is a glossary of terms in the Seven Kingdoms and the Mirrorscape, plus a list of the artistic terms used at the back of each book, which helps with the definition of unknown words.