Review: A Good Story, Not as Charming as Book 1
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 01 27, 2014
Karsen’s quest continues in book two of the Ritthek Cage Trilogy. Let me start by saying that the second book of a three part series must be the most difficult to write. Book two is stuck in the middle between an amazing beginning and what will hopefully be an ending of epic proportions. I loved the first book in this series, and I truly looked forward to getting my hands on book two. It is only natural that I will compare the second installment to the first, since this book could in no way stand on its own.The first seventy pages are pretty uninteresting. There are repeated references to a blue fruit and other minor details that are over described. I also had difficulty with the timeline, since Karsen and Na’alua seemed to arrive in town at the same time, but for her, two months pass while only a day has passed for Karsen. The way these two events are placed in the story had me confused. A simple rearranging of chapters might help the situation, but I can’t be sure, as I am only a reader. Whatever the author was going for here did not work for me, or I overlooked some detail that would have made the timeline more clear.This book contains far too many details for my taste. I don’t need an entire page to describe someone spitting, the sound it made, the consistency and texture, etc. It’s too much. I felt like there were too many scenes that did not advance the plot, and I was dying to know what would happen next after reading the first book. I hate to say it, but this installment was a letdown. None of the new characters appealed to me the way the ones from the first book did. The mystical fantasy air was absent for me, and I found myself mostly annoyed with main character Karsen. The emotional impact his character had on me in book one had me yearning to hear more of his story, but I felt little emotion for him in this book. Here’s hoping book three will recapture the charm of the first.I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.