In this post-Harry Potter era, fantasy novel series that might pick up some of Rowling’s readers are understandably a popular publishing trend. In The Twilight Box, prolific Ontario author Troon Harrison revisits the world and some of the characters of her well-received previous novel The Separated, and leaves enough threads untied that further Tales of Terre are clearly anticipated.

While one scene – the rescue of a character from a perilous high place by friends mounted on a mighty winged mythological creature – clearly recalls the Hippogriff rescue in Harry Potter, The Twilight Box is not particularly reminiscent of Rowling. Its strange and beautiful landscape is drawn from the Mediterranean and North Africa, and its young characters are not English schoolchildren but are clearly set apart from the beginning for a special fate. Inevitably, Harrison recycles many patterns and situations of heroic fantasy, but does so in the service of a very contemporary theme – the need for ethnic groups to live together in harmony, respecting each other’s physical and cultural differences.

As in The Separated, the novel’s focus is divided among three young people, all victims of the city-dwelling, fair-haired Kiffa-walkers, who despise and enslave the dark-haired, nomadic desert people, the Wind-wanderers. The arrogance and greed of the Kiffa-walkers has been brought on by an immensely powerful red-haired witch who marries their ruler and corrupts their minds. It is the task of the timorous Noleena, raised in seclusion, to master her fears and journey to the mountain temple of the moon goddess to obtain help for her people. She is aided by two young men of different racial backgrounds; the three must learn to overcome their prejudices to further their common cause.

Harrison’s descriptive writing is lush and extensive, building a vivid sense of place. The magical duel at the climax of the novel is full of movie-style special effects, but because we know nothing of Noleena’s antagonist, other than that she is an evil red-haired queen, dramatic tension is ultimately lacking. If only the ethnic antagonisms of the real world could be swept away so easily, by killing off one bad leader.