Review: Four Stars--Adventure/Fantasy/Quest/Magic/Romance
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 11 21, 2013
Four Stars--Adventure with Fantasy/Magic TwistI wasn’t sure what to expect with this book–and to be honest, the first time I tried to get through it, it didn’t catch my interest and I wound up putting it down.  (Not the prologue–the prologue’s great, but the exposition of the book lost me.)  I figured I’d pick it up again when I could concentrate better.  A while later, I was driving to another city, and I didn’t have anything to listen to–so I plugged my kindle into my car’s aux and gave it a whirl.Again, I found the beginning clunky.  There were too many characters to follow, and it wasn’t clear which were the most important.  Exposition is heavy handed.  The book starts out like a political court intrigue, and doesn’t reveal itself for what it is until about ten percent of the way through, when the true story, an adventure about a woman and friend trying to save a lost love–suddenly emerges.It’s like the author had a bit of trouble finding her groove, but I’m really glad she did.  Once the writing actually “locks in”, I found I had a really hard time putting the book down.  The plot is fast moving and decently twisty.  The overall story line is hard to predict–characters are in constant peril and you don’t know who is going to end up together–and the characters, while not all super likeable, are developed and complex.  I found myself only mildly irritated by things that would normally aggravate the hell out of me–like the fact that all of the major characters, by virtue of their particular clan, are of the christian faith, and kind of jerks about it–but I really liked how “committed” the author was to getting their mindsets as close to the times as possible.  Yes, some of them are bigoted, egocentric, power hungry, and sexist, but they’re also very real.  The setting is great, descriptions are well done, and dialogue is convincing, and even though a few passages tended to drag, I found the book an overall great read.I received a free copy in exchange for an honest review.