A Spell for Chameleon (Xanth, Book 1)

Customer Reviews

• Speaking for the Xanth series as a whole  Apr 10, 1999 (23 of 24 found this helpful)

  I have read all 22 Xanth novels. Six of them really stand out as good stories: Good, moral, heroic main characters, cool talents and magical abilities, good storyline. They get pretty serious, and it almost seems that Piers is trying to teach young readers through the good, moral, honorable, heroic characters, how to act in real life. But most of them get so congested with puns that there's really nothing going on, and it just gets corny. The six good ones are A Spell for Chameleon#1 Castle Roogna#3 Ogre, Ogre#5 Crewel Lye: A Caustic Yarn#8 Heaven Cent#11 and Question Quest#14. Faun & Games#21 had an OK character named Atilla the Pun. The puns get on my nerves. I like puns, I just don't like Piers Anthony's puns. When he started this series he wrote for young men. Now he writes for troublesome adolescents, it seems. He can't go a book without mentioning breasts and panties. Yes, there is a romance in virtually every Xanth book, but still, the sexual inuendos don't fit; they're out of context. I guess Piers just ran out of cool magic talents for his characters. Because let's face it: that's what made the series. When it had magicians with interesting talents that one could base an entire story on the ramifications of them, it was a good series. It isn't anymore. Read the first 14 and then stop.

• To Ogle an Ogre  Oct 24, 2007 (21 of 24 found this helpful)

  I recently stumbled across a free pile of paperbacks from Piers Anthony's Xanth series. Being the optimist that I am ("Sure, I have space for fourteen books as well as time to read them"), I gathered them in my arms and took them home with me. I'd read most of them before, when I was in middle school, and I had fond, if hokey, memories.
  
  Xanth is a land of magic where every person has one unique talent, ranging from the useful--converting lead into gold--to the less than--creating the odor of soured milk. Magical creatures are inspired by shameless puns, such as night mares, horses that deliver bad dreams, and nickelpedes, dimepedes and quarterpedes that dwarf the centipedes we're familiar with. A sort of lazy quest is at the heart of each book, serving mostly as an excuse for meeting interesting people and prompting silly jokes. In short, they Xanth novels are nice, mindless reading, and I was looking forward to indulging.
  
  Re-reading the first three chapters of the initial book, A Spell for Chameleon, it became clear that all was not as I'd remembered. Sure, the writing was a bit labored, with clunky phrasing and overdone narration, but that was to be expected. Thirteen-year-old me had more pressing concerns than literary naturalism.
  
  What really surprised me about the book was how casually misogynistic it was. Each of Anthony's female characters is ogled as she's introduced. Sabrina, the narrator Bink's girlfriend, is presented with, "Bink looked at the girl beside him as she stepped through a slanting sunbeam. He was no plant, but he too had needs, and even the most casual inspection of her made him aware of this."
  
  Later, a female centaur--a women's torso on a horse's body!--is objectified after rescuing the narrator. Her "plush pillows" provide a cushion for him to rest on after an attack; later, as she jumps a ravine with him on her back, he's forced to grab her breasts to avoid falling.
  
  Upon arriving in a new village, Bink is thrust into the midst of a rape hearing, where a judge seemingly plucked from a Lifetime movie declares, "I presume she would have fled him at the outset, had she disliked him--and that he would not have forced her if she trusted him. In a small community like this, people get to know each other very well, and there are few actual surprises. This is not conclusive, but it strongly suggests she had no strong aversion to contact with him, and may have tempted him with consequence she later regretted. I would probably, were this case to come up in formal court, find the man not guilty of the charge, by virtue of reasonable doubt."
  
  Afterward, Bink is guided out of town by "the most voluptuous, striking black-haired beauty he had ever seen, a diamond in the mud of this region." Wary of false accusations after the trial, he wonders about the wisdom of traveling alone with her, but the bailiff reassures him by saying, "Don't worry about it, son. Wynne don't lie, and she doesn't change her mind. You behave yourself, difficult as that may be, and there'll be no trouble." This comes immediately after he jokes about not being able to blame Bink if he did want to rape her--wink wink, nod nod.
  
  They set out on their journey, but the objectification continues. "She could have made some farmer a marvelous showpiece," Bink observes. "There seemed to be no part of her body that wasn't perfectly molded." Later, her tells her, "'The Magician [an Oz-like figure she looks to for help] charges a year's service. You--would not want to pay.' The Good Magician was male, and Wynne had only one obvious coin. No one would be interested in her mind."
  
  And, that's where I stopped reading.
  
  What's most disturbing about the attitudes being transmitted (well, beyond the Equus redux) is that this is a series designed to appeal to children. As I remember, the books are slightly bawdy, but never graphic; the language is c

• Best of a Series  Jun 27, 2000 (5 of 5 found this helpful)

  This is not only the first of many pun filled books, but the best of the series. The others are fun filled and contain some very good writting. But this book has a well developed plot that is worth reading. Be careful though, for the series seems never ending.

  Xanth is a marvellous place to visit, espically if you are familiar with Florida. Everybody has a magical talent of lesser or greater degree, but our hero seems to lack one, and heads for exile and adventure.

  It is worth your time to pick up this book and follow our heros' adventure.

• Xanth series 1-14 review... Entertaining quick reads  Feb 11, 2004 (10 of 12 found this helpful)

  I passed by these books everytime I went to the book store. I didn't think I would enjoy these novels, they looked too childish. I finally ran out of other fiction to read, so I picked the first book up in a used book store. Boy was I surprised. I enjoyed it so much I decided to buy the whole series. This series definitely has a quirky side to it. However it is a very enjoyable fantasy series. Full of excellent imagery, characters and storylines. Mr. Anthony is constantly coming up with interesting new stories for this series. The puns don't destroy the fantasy element. They add an enjoyable sidenote. These novels took me through a variety of emotions (most of which either had me chuckling or laughing outloud). "Question Quest" (book #14) is the last book in the series that I have read so far. I definitely plan on reading the rest though.

  I have read more than 450 fantasy novels in the past 15+ years, so I am always trying to find something a little new and entertaining. Xanth definitely fills this requirement. I highly recommend these novels for a quick light read.

• a fun beginning  Feb 18, 2003 (14 of 18 found this helpful)

  This is the book that first got me reading fantasy novels. I read this for the first time when I was in 8th grade, I believe (now 23 years old). At the time I found it to be a simple, fun to read novel that got me interested in the world Piers Anthony created. It also got me interested in other fantasy novels, and I moved along from Anthony to Eddings, Brooks, McCaffrey, Feist, Jordan, and Martin. Anthony's Xanth series is what got me started, however.

  I think I've read about half of the Xanth series, and it is apparent that the novels are becoming less and less serious. The books become filled with puns, and everything magic is punned. A Spell for Chameleon is the first Xanth novel, however, and there is very little of the punning that the series is known for (and may be the downfall of the series). This first novel sets up the series and defines what Xanth is and what kind of land this is. Xanth is shaped like Florida, but is not actually connected to the United States. It is a separate world filled with magic. Anthony teases that all of the magical creatures in Earth's legends actually were real (dragons, centaur, harpy, sphinx, etc), but they came from Xanth by mistake. Xanth is a magic land is somehow connected to our world, but not in any fixed location. The human population of Xanth was settled by Mundanes (our world is called Mundania) in a series of waves of Invasion, as the Mundanes (from various parts of the world) discovered passages to Xanth. While humans don't naturally have magic when they arrive, any children born in Xanth do in fact possess magic.

  When this novel begins, we know there is a Shield blocking any more Waves of invasion from Mundania (prior waves had been mostly violent). The king is an old man with failing health and he has decreed that any citizen who has reached his 25th birthday must be able to demonstrate his magical talent (everyone has just one) or be exiled to Mundania (beyond the Shield). Bink is a young man nearing his 25th birthday and he has not yet discovered his talent. He is journeying to the Good Magician Humphrey to discover his talent. As Bink travels, we learn more about what type of land Xanth is, and discover some of the most prominent features of the land. Humphrey knows that Bink has a Magician level talent, but is unable figure out what the talent is. Bink is still to be exiled.

  While I feel that the novel has lost something over the years, it was still a very enjoyable read and it is fun to revisit the world of Xanth.