The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper

This book is the second in The Dark is Rising series, and I gave it a rating of four out of five. Other than Great Uncle Merriman, this book has none of the characters from book one. Will Stanton celebrates his eleventh birthday and notices things are very different; he is the seventh son of a seventh son. The animals seem to shy away from him, and he senses different things. Will discovers that he is actually one of the Old Ones mentioned in the first book, and one of the most powerful. He becomes more powerful as he collects each of the six magical circles, and the Dark fights to stop him before he learns to harness the powers. The Dark becomes more aggressive as Will collects more of the Signs, and the entire population of England may suffer as it becomes their battleground.

The first forty pages of the book were confusing since Will and myself did not know what was happening. Merriman's character shows up and explains things. It took imagination to follow the plot, so some readers may not enjoy that. The events occurred during different time periods, and characters were sometimes frozen in time as the magical characters interacted. The first book in the series can stand by itself, but I think you're committed to reading all five books in the series if you read this one.