Do you love both Magic the Gathering and reading? Then you might like to read some MTG books. That’s all what we’re talking about today. We’ll take a look at most recent books about Magic the Gathering and review them.
We’ll provide a short spoiler-free synopsis and our opinion about the book. The opinions are our own and may not necessarily reflect how you’ll feel about it. We also grade a book on a scale from 1 to 5. Anyways, let’s get right to it.
Sundered Bond
Author: Django Wexler
Sundered Bond is a companion book to Ikoria, Lair of Behemoths set. It’s actually quite a nice read. It focuses on Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast, although he’s not an outcast when a book begins.
He’s a member of the Coppercoats, military force that’s intent on killing monsters. Until Lukka forms a mystical connection with a big winged cat of all things! Vivien Reid also appears in the story, although, we won’t talk much about her. We don’t want to spoil the story.
If you enjoyed the world from Ikoria, as you know it from cards, this book certainly delivers more information about it. Django did a great work with this one.
Grade: 4 – Book is a great read although somewhat short. Provides a great insight into world of Ikoria.
Rise of the Gatewatch: A Visual History
Magic Origins (2015) started a new era of MTG storytelling. Instead of being mostly unfocused and moving from one plane to another, it started following five planeswalkers, who formed the Gatewatch (kinda like Magic’s Avengers). The five original Gatewatch planeswalkers are:
- Gideon Jura
- Jace Beleren
- Liliana Vess
- Chandra Nalaar
- Nissa Revane
The story culminated after four years in War of the Spark (2019).
Rise of the Gatewatch shortly describes all of the major events that happened in this four year span. Therefore it’s a great way to come up to speed with most recent events in Magic’s story line.
As a title suggests it’s not a regular MTG book, since it’s a visual history. You’ll get less text and more pictures of amazing MTG art. If that’s something you’d enjoy, you can order it on Amazon.
Grade: 3.5 – It’s a good book to get up to date with Magic’s story. However, as a art book, we’d like to see it in a bigger version.
The Wildered Quest
Author: Kate Elliot
The Wildered Quest is a companion story to the set Throne of Eldraine. That set had plenty of Adventure cards, and similarly there are lots of adventures in this book.
Main characters warrior-mage twins Rowan and Will (Royal Scions) embark on an adventure to find their missing father, High King Kenrith. On their journey they encounter both Oko,Thief of Crowns and Garruk, Cursed Huntsman. Can the twins solve the mystery of their father’s disappearance and restore him to his throne before it’s too late?
Although the summary description might sound a bit cheesy, The Wildered Quest is actually a surprisingly great MTG book. The world building is amazing, the descriptions are not overdone. It’ll take you on the true adventure through the world of Eldraine.
Most of the characters are well designed, they have both depth and balance. So if you’re looking for a good fresh Magic read, this is a great choice. You can order it on Amazon here.
Grade: 4.5 – One of the best MTG books written in the last years.
War of the Spark – Part 1: Ravnica
Author: Greg Weisman
First part of War of the Sparks takes us to the long awaited battle between Gatewatch and Nicol Bolas – it’s the culmination of four years of Magic’s story! We see many familiar planeswalkers interact, even the ones that have never met before.
Story is pretty fast-paced and seems a bit rushed at certain moments. For example, a certain characters death is a bit out of place and unnecessary. Well, that kind of thing is probably what happens when you have to put so many different heroes in one story.
However, it’s a pretty fun and simple read. It’s great even for people, whose first language isn’t English.
Grade: 3 – Fast and simple read, but nothing truly special.
War of the Spark – Part 2: Forsaken
Author: Greg Weisman
The Forsaken depicts the aftermath of the battle on Ravnica and how the Gatewatch deals with their losses. It sounds promising – however, the book fails to deliver.
Second part of the War of the Spark is certainly even less impressing then the first one. Some of the characters from Magic lore – that we knew for a long time – behave totally different for no good reason.
Even if you just read it without knowing the previous lore, it’s still a very mediocre book. Our advice is – don’t bother with this one.
Grade: 1.5 – Probably the worst Magic the Gathering book in the last decade. Fans don’t like it and neither do we.
Children of the Nameless
Author: Brandon Sanderson
What happens when an incredible author writes a Magic story? Something amazing, most definitely. Children of the Nameless is our favorite story on the list by far.
Don’t know when was the last time that we got to see such an amazing black-aligned character as Davriel, Rogue Shadowmage. You’ll learn plenty about him as well as some special Innistrad lore. That’s right – the story is happening on Innistrad, one of the most popular Magic planes of all times. It’s incredibly well told and very immersive.
If more MTG books were like this, we couldn’t stop reading them
The story was available for free on Wizard’s website until recently when it was taken down for unknown reasons. Once it becomes available we’ll post an update here.
Grade: 5 – It’s simply a perfect MTG story. Another great work of Brandon Sanderson.
More Reading
Do you want to read more about Magic now? We’re not exactly storytellers, but there’s couple of articles that could help you improve at Magic:
If you can’t wait for more Magic books, bookmark this page, We’ll update it whenever a new Magic book becomes available. As we did when the newest MTG set Ikoria, Liar of Behemoths got its own book. You can find out more about Ikoria spoilers here.
Until next time, may you have fun reading good MTG books.