1. Before the land was blighted, Fincayra seems to have been a place much like Gwynedd, except with fantastic creatures and more magic. If you were creating a mythological world parallel to our own, what would you put in it?

How would it "work"?

2. If Branwen had told Emrys the truth about his father and his early years, would things have gone differently in the story? Explain.

3. Emrys's confrontation with King Stangmar resembles the showdown between Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back. View the movie and explain how the two situations are similar, and how they are different.

4. T. A. Barron uses some striking images in this book. Pick one or two, like "shafts of darkness" or the circle of cedars whose bodies looked like ancient men, and try to portray them visually, or in some other...