216 pages

English language

Published Jan. 4, 1999 by Random House.

View on OpenLibrary

4 stars (20 reviews)

Ten-year-old Keladry of Mindalen, daughter of nobles, serves as a page but must prove herself to the males around her if she is ever to fulfill her dream of becoming a knight.

8 editions

Review of 'First Test' on 'Storygraph'

4 stars

Kel is the first girl to train as a page in living memory who is known as a girl during her training. Alanna’s previous example is wielded against her, as it’s assumed by unhappy sexists that Alanna only made it through with help. This provides narrative opportunities for challenges that Alanna didn’t face, or at least new angles on familiar topics (such as bullying). Kel feels older than ten, not enough to be jarring, but enough that I had to keep remembering how young she is. She's handling a lot of stress very well, partly because of coping mechanisms she learned while living in an unfamiliar country with her parents.

Nealan is Kel's sponsor and quickly becomes her friend. Gradually she gets more of a social circle, but it's difficult to be the only girl surrounded by boys when many of the adults in charge are also treating her gender …

Review of 'First Test' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

<blockquote>"You aren't a bit romantic, are you?" he asked, amused.<br/><br/>    She sat back and stared at him. She was beginning to think that Neal required a keeper. He seemed to have the craziest ideas. "Romance? Isn't that love-stuff?" she asked finally.<br/><br/>    "It's more than just love. It's color, and--and fire. You don't want things magnificent and filled with--with grandeur," he said, trying to make her understand. "You know, drama. Importance. Transcendent passion."<br/><br/>    "I just want to be a knight," Kel retorted, putting her used tableware on her tray. "Eat your vegetables. They're good for you." </blockquote><br/><br/>I never quite took to Kel the way I took to pretty much any of Tamora Pierce's other heroines, and I think this pretty much sums up why. I don't care about her not having an interest in romance as in boy-girl love stuff (she's a child at this point, and hey, Alanna was super …

Review of 'First Test' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

My word of warning: I'm probably far from Tamora Pierce's intended audience for these books set in the Tortall universe. I read the Alanna quartet a long time ago and rather enjoyed them. Pierce has obviously spend a long time researching medieval combat and society and it shows in her writing. I liked the characters from the Alanna quartet, so when I saw Immortals and Protector of the Small series on the shelves focusing on different characters, it didn't entice me enough to pick them up.

First Test starts off 10 years after the Alanna quartet and right after the Immortals quartet. I skipped over Immortals, and was startled to see how much Pierce had evolved her world. I'm going to wait on finishing this series until I get through the four Immortals books.

First Test stars Kel, the first female to wish to train as a knight since it …

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Subjects

  • Knights and knighthood -- Fiction
  • Sex role -- Fiction
  • Fantasy