Review: Very Short Story
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 07 7, 2013
Vexed is a short story written to introduce us to S.K. Whiteside's Guardians series.Eerily set up like a Cain and Abel, the book begins with two brothers, sons of the god Ra.  Osiris becomes king and god of the Undead.  His brother, Set, becomes jealous of what is given to Osiris; rulership, the throne, servants, etc., and devises a way to kill him.  By killing his human form and cutting it into pieces, Set is then able to hide away the pieces so that no one of their bloodline is ever able tofree Osiris' spirit and his body.In order to insure even further that Set will remain ruler, he has Osiris' bloodline terminated and claims his mate, the goddess Isis.  Unwilling to yield to Set, he has her abused and sexually assaulted, then imprisoned. Her escape seems impossible until she is set free by an unlikely ally; one who has ulterior motives.It is now that Set should fear a hostile reclaiming of what he stole and yet, he hunts for Isis.  Never underestimate a magical goddess who's husband and family you murdered.This short story was good.  It focused on mythological gods and goddesses and really set the stage for the upcoming full-length novel, Inheritance: The World of Guardians, which has been recently released.  There is a vampiracle twist to the mythology that is really interesting.  It gives a whole new outlook to the gods and goddesses we have grown up reading about.There were some inconsistencies that I couldn't overlook in the grand scheme of reviewing, however.The killing of the children Isis has with Osiris is unclear.  At the beginning of the short it says that Set orders the murder anyone of the bloodline that can potentially take the throne.  Later in the story Isis indicates that her children are indeed dead (pg. 14) but not four paragraphs later the Scribe states that Set is hunting not only Isis, but her children, too.  A couple of lines later, Isis agrees that her children are scattered, hiding.  So, at that point in time, are the children dead or hiding?Also, in the beginning chapter, it is stated that Set is Osiris' younger brother but Set claims on pg. 20 that he's is the oldest (not Osiris) and Set should have been the one claim the throne.Much of the plot is pretty strong, there were just a couple of puzzling issues.Review Copy Courtesy Of:  S.K. Whiteside, in exchange for an honest review.