Review: An Accomplished and Talented Work of Dark Fantasy
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 08 18, 2013
"Shadow Spinner" originally appeared as a multi-part serial, with all of the installments available individually on Amazon. The parts have now been consolidated into multi-part collections. This "Shadow Spinner: Collection 1: Tiberius" collects the first five episodes, or chapters. The series is generally appropriate for middle grade and up readers. I mention that only because there is also a prequel story, "The Evil That Men Do", that everyone seems to agree is adult content. The prequel is very revealing and very helpful and I would recommend that adult readers take a look at it either before starting this series or maybe after reading chapters one and two. I did the latter and found it very illuminating.The Amazon description states that there's a crazy truth about Tib's father and that Tib's Mom might be unhinged, so I don't think what follows will be much of a SPOILER. But here's a SPOILER ALERT anyway, just to be safe. The thing that really distinguishes this book and elevates it to the category of very happy find is the careful and realistic way that Mr. Leon builds up the tension, the dread, the reveals and the threat in this story. Most of the middle grade and YA books I've read go like this: "Hey kid; now that you're 10/12/16/or 18 it's time to suddenly and out of the blue inform you that your father is a daemon/Greek god/Norse god/Satan/drama-queen Angel. Now, let's get out there and have an adventure." That's actually O.K. It gets the book and the adventure rolling and it can work, especially if the book is played mostly for adventure/laughs, (think of, say, Percy Jackson as a good example of this at its best.)There is room, though, for a thinking man's fantasy-father tale. There should be signs and portents. There should be odd things happening around the edges. Mom should be a little damaged and a little mental. Suspicious things should happen and there should be a slow unfolding of what's going to happen and what might happen. That's what you get here.And you get it with real style. These chapters are not overwritten. If anything the structure is spare bordering on minimal. But it's clean and sharp and effective. This makes for a satisfying tale that builds slowly but inexorably to greater and greater dread. Not bad at all. So, if you're looking for something a bit out of the ordinary and much better written than the usual, this is worth consideration.Please note that I found this book while browsing Amazon Kindle freebies. I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.