Review: An Unpolished Mind Forged
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 07 5, 2014
What I would have liked to know before I bought this book. (no spoilers)1. What type of book is it: action, drama, etc? This book is what I would call an unintentional `shonen'(for boys 7-18) light novel. It has `in your face' kid like romance, over the top humor, over the top action and male harem tendencies. This isn't a story to be taken too seriously. The last is intentional (I asked the author).2. What is the story about, in general? The story is about Alex, a beginning yet powerful enchanter, destined for greatness. Along his path of destiny are an assorted range of cute females and girls for fan service. It initially reads like a Tenchi Muyo story (one guy that does everything with a bunch of different age girls congregating around him).3. What/Who is the target audience?  Without a doubt, young adult males. Some young girls might find it entertaining. Manga/light novel fans might enjoy the work.4. Is there character development? None. The characters learn new things but don't evolve out of their rote roles. I don't equal learning new abilities with character evolution. On the other hand, it's a book that isn't supposed to be taken seriously. As a demanding reader, I'm being pretty lenient as a light novel doesn't necessary need deep or complex characters.5. Are the characters likable? The characters embrace their silly quirks, over the top romantic drama and manga style events in equal measure. They are likable in that respect. At the same time, they are too `over the top' to be very compelling characters.6. Does the story keep its pacing? This is where I start to be very critical. The story never finds its pace. Even a light story should not forsake basic scene mechanics. Initially, there is no memorable effort to develop the mood of most scenes. The scenes have brief descriptions and mood effects are treated in a careless manner. This is conducted to move the story along.Scene details are predominantly provided by hokey verbosity from the characters. For example: If two characters are moving in the darkness before sunrise, one will provide a statement like ` you wake me up before dawn, without telling me anything, at this god forsaken hours ... blah blah'.  See that sort of statement is a `staged' conversation used to tell the reader what's going on. At the same time, the dialogue involving such a `staged conversation' feels faked, like a commercial directed at an audience instead of at the other character. It's one of the things all writers, and even movie creators, have to try and avoid or they lose immersion. Don't get me wrong, using dialogue to explain a scene is a well used story mechanic. Yet, it has to be properly applied for it to not exude that `fakeness'.The `staged dialogue' problematic is a predominant and constant problem through this entire work. There are so many conversations that are directed at the reader, instead of really at the other character, that the narrative and story break reader immersion. The hokey verbosity causes many conversations to exacerbate the one dimensional nature of many of the characters. Thus, another reason that immersion fails.The pacing is random. The story might be rushing along, the next it meanders without direction and stalls, before suddenly taking off again. Sadly, mood and scenery is STILL treated cursory when the story pace slows down.  That causes even further loss of immersion and, by extension, story flow.7. Do you have to suspend disbelief? With the understanding that there is a certain degree of disbelief involved in a half-silly novel, the girls are too `girlish'. Most of them are cute hugging and giggling machines that simply cannot help the kisses. It's a completely harem story.Characters discuss traumatic events openly without acknowledging the severity of such deep personal problems with not only dramatic tears, but with the correct setting for such conversations. When you're going to tell a deep dark secret, you probably won't do it at the dinner table in front of ten different friends (unless you're very drunk). You'll do it in private, to that particular person and it will be difficult to discuss. That provides the NECESSARY RESPECT for the effort involved in such a revelation. This book absolutely forgoes such respect in spades. Thus, the lack of severity in those scenes strains my disbelief.Since the novel isn't to be taken too seriously, you have to judge for yourself if that is acceptable.8. Is the book worth the asking price?  It is $3 ebook. I think that's a pretty low ball price for any electronic format work of this length.In conclusion: Hokey character dialogue, lack of character evolution and lack of credible mood in scenes break story immersion and severely impact story pacing. The lightness of the novel intellectually excuses a lot of the slipshod scenes but does not help lessen the impact of such immersion loss. Though the syntax of the story is a mess, the story itself is kind of nice: romance, hero, family values, loads of girls, intrigue, etc....  It's not a bad first attempt at a light novel, though readers will really have to be undemanding to enjoy it for what it is. The price is pretty low at $3, and shouldn't strain anyone's pocket. For me, it was a slightly below average experience but I am TENTATIVELY going to read the next installment, though with trepidation.2.5 stars