Apprentice Cat: Toby’s Tale (Malkins and Mages #1)

Author: Virginia Ripple

4.5 out of 5 stars

Toby is a young cat preparing to head to the School of Mages to hopefully be chosen to partner with a human mage. While he is chosen, he ends up partnered with Lorn Ribaldy, the nephew of a traitor who tried to blow up the High council. And they soon learn that their acceptance to the school is provisional. There best chance at staying in school is solving the disappearance of Toby’s father, a loner cat (cats without human partners), who was on a mission for the High Council. As they learn more, they realize that Lorn’s uncle may have been framed and that the real traitors may be more powerful than expected.

The story was well written, overall, and had some nice descriptive writing. The plot was intriguing, and there were some funny moments. I will say that it was obvious early on who the main villain is for this book, but the actual mastermind remains a mystery until the last chapter. There were plenty of clues in the first two chapters that I easily connected, which made it easy to figure out what was going on to some degree and made, so some things that were revealed later were obvious.

The characters were all interesting and well written. I liked that the cat characters acted like cats, like licking their paws clean. I liked Toby and Lorn. Toby is gifted magically and has an amazing sense of smell. He’s very determined to prove himself, especially to his mother. His mother is very harsh and demanding and can come across as uncaring, but we learn from a conversation Toby eavesdrops on that she does love him and worries a lot about him. Lorn struggles with his magic and has humorous accidents with it, like setting things on fire. However, his father has no faith in his ability to become a master mage, so he’s also a sympathetic character. Lorn also has to deal with nearly everyone believing his uncle is a traitor. Two important side characters are Terrence and Master O’dorn. Toby and Terrence become friends on their first day. Terrence ends up not being chosen to partner with a human so starts training to become a loner cat. He comes from a poor district and is determined to do better in life. Master O’dorn is Toby’s mother’s partner. He is shown to be wise and kind and gives Toby and Lorn a lot of information about Toby’s father.

I enjoyed this book. I decided to rate this book 4.5 out of 5 stars because of how some parts of the plot were obvious. I didn’t go lower because it seems that the story is meant to focus on the investigation and how Toby, Lorn, and their allies are able to stop them and less about keeping things a mystery from the reader. If you like stories with magic, talking cats, and characters fighting against hidden agendas, then you’ll enjoy this book.

Price through Amazon Kindle: $0

Link to buy: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009KAM766

(I do not benefit from the use of this link.)