Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, and it has been told in another book called The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe how they had a remarkable adventure. They had opened the door of a magic wardrobe and found themselves in a quite different world from ours[. …] That had all happened a year ago, and now all four of them were sitting on a seat at a railway station with trunks and playboxes piled up round them. […]

Narnia has been at peace since Peter, Susan, Lucy and Edmund helped rid the kingdom of the evil White Witch. But the Sons of Adam and the Daughters of Eve have returned to their own world and a dark presence now rules this once harmonious land..

Wicked King Miraz has imposed a pernicious new order of persecution and imprisonment, but the King’s nephew and rightful heir, young Prince Caspian, realizing the evil of his uncle’s regime, vows to revive Narnia’s glorious past. Fearing for his life, he is forced to flee and calls on the four children, the magic of the mighty lion Aslan, and an army of fauns, dwarfs and woodland spirits to help him in his seemingly impossible task.

Book 2 in The Chronicles of Narnia series.

Like the first Chronicle of Narnia, Prince Caspian opens quickly. An unknown magical force draws Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie off a train platform and back to the magical land they once ruled as kings and queens. But things never happen the same way twice. Soon the children learn Aslan has not called them to regain their thrones, but to fight another enemy and crown a new king. Pacing starts slow but creature lore grows in C. S. Lewis’s sequel, introducing practical tyrants and talking-beast politics into a Narnian resistance. Some newcomers may struggle with Caspian’s nonlinear plotting. Older or returning readers, however, will find that every year they grow older, they will find this return to Narnia a little bigger.¹

Best for: Fans eight and up for personal reading, slightly younger for reading aloud.

Discern: Wicked king forces boy prince into exile, beasts debate themes of human ancestry, mythical creatures include lowercase-G “gods” and discuss prophecies in the stars, wicked beings attempt black sorcery to call back a dead enemy but are rebuked, several battles include summarized violence and at least one beheading.