The book was fine, but really nothing special. The characters all had annoying little quirks but were otherwise fine, but I never really got too attached to any of them. The storyline was fine too, but none of the events were particularly exciting, and the mystery of what happened to Septimus Heap was easy to figure out early on. 
 The writing style was nice, every bit like a traditional children's fantasy novel. And there was some good imagination in the story (the chicken boat, the bit about the ghosts' travel restrictions, and pretty much everything about Aunt Zelda's cottage and the little island it's on). However, the story moved along slowly and was overall unremarkable.