Review: Just OK
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 06 15, 2012
This book was just OK.  Not that great but not bad either.  I finished the book, and mostly enjoyed it while I read it.  But really, when I was done, I had to admit I wouldn't miss the story or characters one bit.Now there were some good points.  For example, the author creates a civilization in which the tribe is the basic organizing social structure.  Not only are tribes the basis around which towns/cities are built, but they also dramatically affect the cultural norms by which the members live.  We see tribes that are matriarchal, tribes that are essentially hunter-gatherers, tribes that are religious based, etc., etc.  Overall, I found this to be an interesting feature; albeit unrealistic that all these tribes would live in very close proximity for a thousand years and have virtually no knowledge/understanding of each other.The story itself is fairly interesting:  it tells the story of the good guy main character, who of course is unknowingly more than he seems, as he rises to greatness leading the good tribes against all that is evil.  Along the way there is the obligatory meeting of his soul mate and resulting insta-love.  This romantic element, however, wasn't the focus of the book and didn't overwhelm the story.My main criticisms were:1) I thought the characters were two dimensional at best.  The main character is helped in his journey to greatness by 3 secondary characters.  None of these secondary characters were fully developed, in my opinion.  Now one character is meant to be somewhat mysterious, I get that.  Nevertheless, since this particular character is instrumental in the development of the main character, I really would have expected more insight into his background and motivations.  The main character's love interest as well didn't get fully fleshed out.  She, in particular, had an interesting experience during the book that could have been more fully told.2) My second problem had to do with the muddled theology in the book.  There are apparently evil spirits and what appear to be fallen angel-like creatures, there are apparently good-guy angel-like creatures, there appears to be a good god, and there appears to be a satan-like creature.  Now I used the word "appears" in all of those previous phrases because none of this is very well explained.  Since this "war" between the good god/angels and bad god/angels is the main impetus of the story, the muddled presentation of all of this was very unsatisfying.  In the end, for me, it dramatically increased my level of impatience with the story.3) I thought the combat descriptions were either confusingly written or the author doesn't really have a good feel for what this sort of medieval-level of war fighting would be like.  It got a little tiring reading about every other character wielding their sword/axe in circles and mowing down dozens of opponents at a time.  Yet that's the kind of battle description we repeatedly received.  No mention of a shield wall, formations, tactics, etc.  And I won't even bring up the author's idea of good tactics being that a city garrison, outnumbered 2 or 3 to one, particularly in cavalry, would choose to confront this overwhelmingly superior force outside the city walls on the open battlefield (OK, I lied and brought it up anyway).4) Lastly, I got tired of the main character being "too good".  He has no flaws.  He's good looking.  He is always good natured.  He is super intelligent.  He is always diplomatic.  He is the bravest one around.  His prowess in combat is unequalled.  Although he's just a farm boy, he gets the noble girl.  Add to all of that the magical blessings that make his armor impenetrable and the magic from his sword unstoppable and the main character, for me, became just another boring Mary Sue.Now even with all of those shortcomings I found in the book, the book was mostly entertaining.  I'm not sorry I bought it.  But when the sequel comes out, I won't be buying it.