Review: A Solid, Entertaining Read
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 21, 2013
I almost was turned off from the story because there were so many terms and names and history just dumped into the first few pages that my eyes crossed a little trying to keep track of it. Fortunately, it started moving better after that and I was able to move along with it.Over all, I liked the world building. There were points when there was too much information and other times when things weren't fully explained that I would have liked to have seen. I really liked the Kuhrisch. If there's a big, barbarian brute of a person or race, I'm all about it. So, I like the Kuhrisch and Horst and Rufus. A lot.(Like, I'm SO all about the Northmen in Joe Abercrombie's stuff. The Kuhrisch felt similar but not identical, and I liked that.)The mix of familiar real life stuff -- the use of French terms and German names, for example -- is interesting, as well as the mixing of the mage magic, like fantasy and paranormal together. The mage combat was fun to read and I liked how they had balancing weakness, like how tired they are after "shifting" animal forms.This book was interesting to read for me. It moves well enough and I enjoyed it, generally speaking, and curiosity compelled me, but I didn't feel a lot of tension for most of it; not till the end. Horst was kind of just pulled along till the very end and I would have liked to have seen him take control more, but where we went with Francis was a surprise and interesting.The story was interesting, though I found it was overwritten in some areas and in others it kind of dragged and wandered. There was an almost pointless feeling to a lot of it, things happening that I wasn't sure why or didn't fully grasp how it all tied in (except maybe sequel fodder) and yet even so, I did enjoy it. I didn't really mind and it never made my eyes cross trying to finish it.Singular points I really enjoyed: the Kuhrisch, the tree, the snow bear, White has a very amusing way of writing about dogs, and I liked the concept of the Dames and their counter-point nature to the golems.I hear tell from the author that the next book will have a lot of focus on the Kuhrisch, so I will definitely be checking that out. For this one? 4 stars.