"I spent my life folded between the pages of books." -Tahereh Mafi

Some of my reviews are normal non-spoilery reviews. But some of reviews contain lots and lots of spoilers to help you (and me!) remember what happened when the next book in the series finally comes out. Both review types are clearly marked.

Sunday, June 15, 2014

The Camelot Code by Mari Mancusi

This review is spoiler free!!

This book is ridiculous! In the best way possible!! I love Mari Mancusi books because they're so fun and adorable and ridiculous! 

This story is told from 4 different perspectives (but all 3rd person POV). First we have Sophie, aka Lady Bella, who spends most of her time playing a Camelot based mmorpg with her best friend Stu and another guy named Melvin. Stu, aka Lord Vanquish, has a secret crush on Sophie and even with all the drama and danger happening, is generally more worried about asking her to the upcoming school dance. Then there's Arthur. He's not king yet, he hasn't pulled the sword from the stone, he knows nothing about his destiny. He dreams of being a knight and being able to marry his best friend Guinevere. And Guinevere, who's...well, she's there.

Guin accidentally drops a super important magical scabbard into the Well of Dreams, transporting it to the 21st century. Without this scabbard, history will be horribly changed. So Merlin enlists the help of Sophie to find it, transporting her back in time.
"How familiar are you with Arthurian legend?" he asked her as he led her back into his office.""I'm a level seventy-nine Camelot's Honor druid. What do you think?"

Merlin, by the way, is actually Melvin, the random guy her and Stu have been playing Camelot's Honor with for years. Of course. Because of course he's been able to hook up an internet connect in Medieval times. Hey, just go with it!
"It's good to meet you in real life at last. I'm Merlin," he said, holding out a hand." Though you might better know me as Melvin-Oh-One, your super leet healer from Camelot's Honor."

In the meantime, Arthur tries to go after the scabbard, transporting himself to the 21st century. Now Merlin needs someone to stand in for Arthur, otherwise who will pull the sword from the stone and become High King?? Sophie offers up Stu and Merlin transports him to the past as well. 
Merlin ran a wrinkled hand through his shock of white hair. "Well, you know that sword in the stone quest you wanted me to run your character through?" he asked. "What if we...well...what if we did a real-life run-through? It won't level you, of course. But it would definitely save my life. Not to mention the future of the world."

While Stu is pretending to be Arthur, Sophie goes back to the future to convince Arthur to go back. Which is a lot harder than it sounds. The 21st century is pretty awesome to poor kid from Medieval England. 
Arthur stared at him in disbelief. "Everyone's equal here?" he repeated, not sure if he was understanding right. "I mean, even the serfs?""Sure. Even those of us who surf," Tristan agreed.


The time travel stuff in this book doesn't make a lot of sense, but that's okay with me. This book isn't hard sci-fi and doesn't try to be. This book is just plain fun - I giggled repeatedly! There's plenty of geeky references to Star Wars and Back to the Future and such. And the budding romance between Sophie and Stu is just plain sweet. I love how adorably geeky both of them are. 

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