Gate Thief

Danny North is a teenager in a rural Virginia high school. He is also one of the most powerful mages in the universe. I liked this book and wish I would have read it before Gatefather. All of the points of the third book in the series make a lot more since after reading this one. It is primarily about a powerful teenager coming to terms with his great power - trying to use it to help people, while not taking too much glory or hurting others. However, he is also a teenager. In a weakened state he is susceptable to problems that can cause the powers of evil to overtake him. However, through generosity he is able to limit the scope of the evil ones. Could a teenager really be this smart and this hormonally driven at the same time?)

Gatefather

I had thought that I read the second book in the series before reading this one. Alas, I had not, and that left made this a bizarre metaphysical exploration. The book spends much of its time exploring life after death and the internal battle between good and evil. By having the second book The Gate Thief, fresh on your mind, this would all make sense in the story. But without that context, it seems to be just about an author preparing for the end of his life.

In addition to the metaphysical exploration, we also get a war between the gods of another world, using modern technology. Modern military weapons have a greater capacity to cause destruction. When these are combined with "mage" powers, they can be more destructive than anything on this or the other world. There are also subplots of a queen whose body is occupied by her rival, high school kids that know a powerful mage, and the battle between body-less evil influencers.

The book got better as it moved along. It would be better after reading the second book in the series.

Lost Gate

The story centers around some "mages" who live in our contemporary world. They are descendants of the ancient Norse gods, but now live in isolation with limited powers. The typical powers tend to be a close relation with animals or materials (thus a stone mage could mold rock in to any particular form.) They have original come via a great gate from their distant world. However, an ancient mage closed all of the gates years ago. Any mage that starts to show gate-magery is quickly put to death.

So that brings us to a teenager who discovers that he is a gate mage - and thus runs away. He hooks up with some underworld figures, later leaving them to hook up with "orphan" mages. There is also a parallel story of another gate mage who "comes out of a tree" to participate in castle intrigue in a remote kingdom. Eventually, the teenager creates a great gate, and the tree man tries to close it, only to have the teenager defeat his closure.

The underlying magic is a slight variation of the system in Card's Alvin Maker series. It gets confusing at times; however, setting the fantasy in the contemporary world makes it much more accessible.