The Grey King by Susan Cooper

At last! I made it through a book in The Dark is Rising series…though, to do it, I had to listen to it on audiotape. This was the last book in the series. Somehow I felt like I was missing a lot by not reading the earlier books. I didn’t understand how Will came to know he was an Old One. What does it really mean to be an Old One? Were there earlier mentions of Arthur and Guinevere? What else did Will have to obtain other than the harp? What is the difference between the Dark and the Light? Were all of these or any of these addressed in the earlier books?

Will made for an interesting hero, part boy, part wise man. His path led him to Wales and to the young mysterious Braun. The story reveals that Braun was brought to our world by his mother, but we are left unclear about Braun’s origins and his place in the story until the very last pages of the book.