Review: Will Va'del ever make it home?
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 11, 2013
Brittle Bonds by Dean Murray continues the tale of Va'del.  The Guadel have a long journey back up the mountain ahead of them and Va'del has some rather disturbing theories.  Finding out that all is not right at home Va'del and Jain must travel back down the mountain and try to blend in a local village until the weather warms up and they can try to do something to help out at home.It has been awhile since I read any of the Guadel books so it took me a bit to get back into the flow of things.  That being said it really wasn't difficult to merge back into the world that Dean has created.  I also really enjoy how much Va'del has changed over the course of the three books.  Through all of the hardships he has faced there has been some real personal growth and Jain has been there helping and maturing along with him.This book has Va'del and Jain helping to rescue a group of women who can use magic like the Guadel women, but are kept as slaves by the empire where they live.  The variances in perspective are very interesting in this book.  To see the priests who are in charge of oppressing the gifted women doing what they do with the full belief that it is the proper thing to do really shows how warped of a world view people can have if the don't challenge things.  Even when a priest doesn't believe in being as harsh as some others, he still believes in the rhetoric with all of his being.Jain and Va'del coming in with a different worldview allows them to see how terrible the system really is and give them the strength to fight.  There are some interesting revelations throughout this book and Va'del continues to learn new skills that will hopefully prove how special he really is to his own people.I hope that wait for book four is a bit shorter than the wait for book three was as I'm extremely curious of what's next for the two wanderers.