Review: Not as much to go on as I hoped...
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 07 1, 2011
I thought this book started out fairly well.About half way through there came one plot element/device that pretty much occupied the rest of the story.That's okay, but not great.  It left me with the feeling that not too much happened.The world seemed a bit thin and there were few compelling allusions to anything greater and deeper churning within the as-yet-untold-story behind the story.I waffled a bit between a 3 & a 4 rating, but I did enjoy the read, so I opted for the 4.As other commenters mentioned, there's a lot of hiccups to the writing due to incorrect grammar and occasionally the narrative will shift very temporarily to first person and jolt the reader out of the story.There's also that horrible horrible war between 'effect' and 'affect' that is rampant within this book.  These words are commonly misused within the book, which obviously irritated other reviewers more than it did me, yet I was not completely immune.What bothered me more was the lack of characterization and rationale for the actions of certain characters.  Some characters seemed stupid-angry simply because it was the only way to advance the plot in the direction the author wanted.Obviously I liked the book in certain ways.  I liked the main character.  I liked the process in which he began making a place for himself in his world.  I liked the relationships he had with several of his peers (and I liked several of those peers).  I liked the general description of the world.  I even liked the beginning of the main conflict, and a bit of the middle of the main conflict (though it seemed to drag on at some points).The question is how much promise does this author and this series have?  Will I pay $2.99 for the second book in the series?Right now I'm leaning against it.But if my current stash of $0.99 fiction runs dry, it will be in the realm of possibility.