Review: Imaginative, but epics should be more epic than this
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 02 10, 2013
Warrior's Rise by LJ DeLeon is the first book of an epic paranormal urban fantasy series.The world created by DeLeon is cohabited by normal people (that's us - at least I'm guessing you're normal?) and supes (weres, fae, mages, Druids, daemons, vampires, gargoyles, basilisks, and any other magical creature you've ever seen in any other book).Many of the supes are good, working to keep the planet in balance in service to The Goddess. Some, however, are evil. And some of those evil guys hold influential positions in business and governmental agencies. (That's explains a lot, eh?) All of the supes are undercover, posing as Norms. The human race is completely unaware of their presence in their midst.Imagine the surprise and complete panic as the deception is revealed when the Dark Lord sets out to take down the veil between the Underworld and our world.Fortunately, the humans and good supes have someone powerful on their side in their battle against the powers of evil - the Caidh Arm, Deva. She's a young bartender who is raised up and given lots of cool supernatural powers by The Goddess.Where there's a young, beautiful heroine, there must be a tall, dark, and handsome hero. In this book, that's Paidrag, Crown Prince of the Fae. And you can guess what happens next. There's a little cha-cha-cha, but mostly it's the soul mate telepathy stuff.Deva and Paidrag must overcome obstacles to gather their forces to prepare for the oncoming war.There are a few battle scenes, but they are as sketchy as the sex scenes. In the middle of the war, Deva, Paidrag, and many of their leadership team are able to take a few days off to go the the court of the Fae for their wedding. This is where the first book ends.There's a lot of imagination here, but not enough action. A lot of threats, a little fighting, a little sex, a lot of Deva's interior monologue - I want more conflict out of a fantasy about an epic war between good and evil.Some of the Amazon reviews complain about poor editing. I agree that it could be better, but it only disrupted the flow of my reading a few times. They also complain about the juvenile writing. Epic fantasy isn't exactly known for nuance in character or layering in plot. The problem is that this epic just isn't nearly epic enough, leaving the lack of nuance and layering readily  apparent.I'm sure the author's skills will grow as she continues writing this series. I just didn't like this book enough to invest $5 for the second book in the series.I'm giving this book 3 stars as it was enjoyable for the imaginative world DeLeon has created. The average review on Amazon is 4 stars, so if this sounds interesting, go read some of the other reviews and see what you think.