Review: Great comeback for KH!!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 09 6, 2012
This novella was terrific.  The author didn't make the mistakes that plagued his last book.  Unlike the last book, he developed his characters in the story (with a good backstory) and better developed the goddess who watches over him.  The author also stops using the one trick pony solution to every fight (a sword).  The author brought real character description to Odin, and most importantly, stopped  volumes of inane chatter with the characters dog that in the last book did nothing to move the story forward.  The story here smoothly moved forward and flowed, unlike his last book which was choppy little stories with lots of empty filler.  I will buy KH's next book.  He has the capability of being a great author.  However, to achieve Jim Butcher like status, KH needs to add NEW capabilities, Further develop the characters as he dd with Odin and the main characters back story.  Maybe he could tackle the back story of one of his main gods or even an an elemental (give them surprising intelligence motives or abilities)  Most of all, he needs to push on why we should care about the main character (ala Dresden).  What drives him.  What are his noble traits and his character flaws.  There was one disconnect in this book.  He is a Druid.  Sex is pretty natural in his world.  He builds up a big tension between him and his apprentice.  Not sure this is a fruitful story line.  Not becuas of sex (KH does a great job of between the character and a goddess).  It's just that ultimately, it doesn't work in the teacher and student as a plot line, no matter how its resolved.  The important thing is that many of the defects in the last book were cured here, though not all.  KH has to strive to be better with every book.  For a model, he should look to the character development acjieved by Butcher in books 5 thru 12 of the Dresden files.  Butcher too went from average inbooksn1 thru 4 to great innbooksn5 thru 12.  He grew as an author through coherence, back stories, character development in both tools and magic ability and world development. KH has the tools - he just needs to strive to be better every single work.  Stay away from the temptation to rely too much on the formula of the last book.