Book Review: Red Leaves and the Living Token - Benjamin David Burrell

Hello Everyone,

I had the opportunity to review the story Red Leaves and the Living Token, by Benjamin David Burrell.  It's a good story with a lot of potential. It is the first in what appears to be a series of three.

The story is a about a man named Raj, and his son, Emret, who is in a hospital for a disease that is threatening his life. It's much like you would see with young cancer patients in our world. In this world, there are three main races of people, the Petra, Zo, and the Botan. It seems to be like our modern world in many ways. Then again it seems old fashioned at times as well. Emret is desperate to find a cure, and will do anything to find it. Raj, on the other hand, is a very protective parent in hopes of a medical breakthrough. When Emret disappears from the hospital with his favorite nurse in search of a legendary cure, Raj is out of his mind in order to get his dying son back safely. In the interest of not spoiling the story, I will stop there.

As I said before, this story has a lot of potential. Unfortunately, it didn't quite live up to it. From a fantasy aspect, it's nothing I would call typical, which is a good thing. The bad thing was how underdeveloped the setting was and the background aspect of things. I'm not sure if that is coming across correctly. What I mean is how the three main races were never really described at all, and I felt as if I was imagining the characters incorrectly. Correction, I was. I found myself picturing them as regular humans. A little more background information and/or description of them would have helped considerably.

Another detriment to the book was the obvious lack of editing. I often found spelling and grammar mistakes. Some were so obvious that I wasn't sure if it was edited at all. I find this to be a common theme among indie authors, and I assume it's mostly caused by financial restraint or just knowing someone who is qualified to lend a hand in proofreading. However, there is no need for it to be as bad as it was in this story. I can understand some things being overlooked, but contend that standards still need to be met by indie authors.

What the author did do very well was getting into the emotions of the main characters, especially Raj, Emret, and Rinacht. There were some points in the story where I expected him to delve a little deeper and he didn't, yet then he would go further in unexpected spots which rounded it out nicely. To me this is one of the author's stronger aspects in his writing, and that kept me going through the book.

Overall, I am giving Red Leaves and the Living Token 3 stars. I found the story to be 'ok', everything considered. I am still undecided on whether or not to continue reading this series. However, if I do, it will be because of my curiosity about the fantasy aspect of the story, and whether or not the author improves on it. 

For those of you who wish to take a look at this book for yourselves, it can be found on several ebook websites, including Smashwords.com, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon. There is also his website www.benburrell.com if you would like to learn more about the author himself.

Until next time,

R. M.

Book Review - The Grimoire: Lichgates by S. M. Boyce

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12900806-the-grimoire

Hello Everyone,

Another book read, and time for another review. The book is The Grimoire: Lichgates, by author S. M. Boyce. Here's a description from the book's page on goodreads.com.

"The Grimoire turns its own pages and can answer any question asked of it, and Kara Magari is its next target. She has no idea what she's getting herself into when she stumbles across the old book while hiking a hidden trail. Once she opens it, she's thrown into Ourea: a beautiful world full of terrifying things that all want the Grimoire's secrets. Everyone in this new world is trying to find her, and most want to control her.

Braeden Drakonin grew up in Ourea, and all he’s ever known of life is lying. The Grimoire is his one chance at redemption, and it lands in his lap when Kara Magari comes into his life. He has one question to ask the book – one question that can fix everything in his broken life – and he’s not letting Kara out of his sight until he gets an answer.

There’s no escaping Ourea. There’s no going back now."

Ok. So here's what I think of the book. It left me feeling a bit bipolar, so bear with me cause it will get better. 

The title and genre got me excited. I love fantasy books about magic and medieval stuff, different worlds, all of that is great. I was incredibly let down by the beginning of the book. To be completely honest, if I was not reading this book to give the author a review, I don't believe I would have gotten through the beginning. For me, it was that bad. It took no time whatsoever for Kara to find herself in the midst of all the action. I'll admit that sometimes action happening right away in a story is good, and that could have happened here, too, if the author had expanded on Kara's background more. Here was someone who was obviously the main character of the story, and before I could create any bond with her, she fell through the lichgate and into the new world of Ourea, and became the Vagabond. On top of that the author's descriptives in the story were just kind of 'blah' and not really polished. What I really wanted was to know more about her troubled past and how it affected her. I never got a real sense of that in the beginning of the book, and it left me not wanting to root for her right away. Another way I can describe it is by the movie Labyrinth, starring Jennifer Connelly and David Bowie. I love Jim Henson stuff and I expect it to not get too crazy into a plot line. Connelly is thrown into the mix right away as a result, which works for the movie, but not in a book. At least not for me, anyway.


So leave that aside, because I did continue on. As the book went forward the world of Ourea opened up to me. I liked a lot of it, and it was enough that I was able to ignore the author's use of descriptives and sometimes cheesy dialogue (kind of like what you would hear on Hercules or Xena). The blood loyalty within the races of Yakona was something I found fascinating. A lot can be done with that, and my mind wandered as I explored all the possibilities. Along the way the author finally expanded on Kara's background and how the loss of her mother affected her. If more had been done on that at the beginning of the book, I would have liked it. So now I get to know her more, and now i want to root for her. 

The Drenowith, or Muses, were a fairly cool addition to the world as well, and their importance in the story is evident from the moment they were introduced. That being said, I felt there were some other areas that could have been stronger. The story lacked some minor details in the lands where Kara visited. All of them had a decent start to help my imagination out, but a little more time on it could have made it a lot better. Her storyline of the impending war was great for me, and I have to admit the book began to grow on me without me realizing it. I even noticed as I was reading towards the end of the book that the writing style I did not like in the beginning had changed into something stronger. It was slight, but it was there, and I can say now that I will read the next book in the series. It's almost as if I was witnessing the author mature as a writer with each chapter. I am glad I stuck it out to the end.

Despite the book's four star ending, the beginning nearly ruined the whole thing for me. I cannot in good conscience give this book even three and a half stars. It has to be three stars, which is 'ok' in my book. I do want to give it a little plus beyond the three - a kind of footnote that reads, "I believe this series is going to be way better than my rating of this first book would indicate." 

So there you have it, 3+ (the plus is not a half a star) stars for The Grimoire: Lichgates. S. M. Boyce, towards the end of the book you showed a lot more focus and it pulled me in. I have a positive feeling in my gut that you will not disappoint in the upcoming sequel. I will be waiting.

Click the captioned link under the picture above to find the book's page on Goodreads.com. From there you should be able to find out how to obtain your own copy. Happy reading everyone!

Until next time, 

R. M.

E-book Review: The Dragon's Path by Daniel Abraham

 Hello everyone,

It has been quite a while since I have posted a book review on the blog. Having served as judge for the Global E-book Awards has prevented me from posting any reviews on what I read until the winners are announced in August. This is the first book I have completed reading since.

 

     

     The Dragon's Path, by Daniel Abraham is a story set in medieval times in a different world. According to its written history, the world was created by dragons, who once ruled everything. They created man and all its different races to serve them. The dragons have long since been gone, and now its the age of man that rules, although the races are still somewhat in the caste system the dragons had intended them. I will attempt to give you more vague details so as not to give you the story itself.

     The story itself follows different characters. Two such characters are nobles under the Antean king. Dawson is the king's childhood friend who plays the political game amongst the other nobles to win the kings favor in the name of preserving the kingdom. Geder is the son of Lerer, another noble. Geder is continually picked on and humiliated by other nobles and lords for being out of shape, gullible, and a bookworm (more specifically speculative essays concerning the dragons' histories). He becomes a pawn in the schemes of adversarial nobles who try to win the kings favor. Along the way he becomes somewhat of a reluctant hero/mass murderer, depending on the view. From there he comes into his own with the aide of Basraship (very key figure) and quickly ascends rank and title under the king.
      

    The other story centers around the characters Marcus Wester and Cithrin. Marcus is a world famous captain who lost his family and now works for hire. His partner, Yardem is his lifelong companion in battle who stays with him. They are hired by a bank to smuggle its wealth into another city in fear of the Antean invasion of the city Vanai. The bank sends Cithrin, a ward of the bank. She is disguised as a young boy to deliver the smuggled wealth. Captain Wester hires an acting troupe to be pretend guards for the operation. Mishaps occur and they end up in the free city of Port Oliva, where Cithrin takes major risks to protect the wealth and start a life of her own. 
 

     The King's Blood is the second book in this series. By the end of The Dragon's Path the two plot lines have barely intersected. It should be interesting to see how they intertwine later.
 

As for my opinion of the book itself, I found it to be an enjoyable read. Its difficult for me to accurately describe, but his use of metaphors are pleasant, and go a long way in describing characters in ways that hold my interest, whereas many other authors would leave me incredibly bored.
 

     It is also worth noting that he is not taking the classic good versus evil approach. Characters fall into varying degrees of good and evil and I think it relies heavily on the reader's own interpretations. These are what makes it a good book for me. I will most definitely be looking forward to part 2, The King's Blood. 
 

     I give The Dragon's Path a solid 4 star rating. It's not too far from being even better, but the lack of quality editing was apparent. Simple spelling mistakes and grammatical errors were not rampant, but enough for me to remember it. I encourage anyone who enjoys reading fantasy to pick this one up and give it a go. You may be surprised at what you get.

 

Be on the lookout for Audism Experiment #3 within the next week. It should be fun. I am still collecting data for experiment 2. 

 

Until next time,

 

R. M.  

Read an E-Book Week Coming Up!

Hello to all,


I just wanted to take a minute to let everyone know that March 4-10 is "Read an E-Book Week". Many ebook authors are putting up their ebooks for free or at discounts with coupon codes. I can't wait to check them out and see what I can find. I am challenging all of you readers out there to do the same. Go to Smashwords.com for discounted and free ebooks. My ebooks will be there as well, and you can find them at these links:

Free:
One Way Out, Always (Allesandra's Bequest - Chapter One) http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/123500
...
Free with code RE100 :
Shadow Boxerhttp://www.smashwords.com/books/view/114915

$1.00 with code REW50 :
Allesandra's Bequesthttp://www.smashwords.com/books/view/134808


If you don't have an ereader, you can still use your pc by downloading Adobe Digital Editions, a free ereader app that will allow you to read .epub and .pdf files. It's a great app and works well on the pc. I hope you take the time to look at Smashwords.com next week. There are many great authors there who are fairly unknown in the book world, and they deserve some recognition. The best way to do that is to get some fans, so take some time and check it out. Happy hunting, all!


R. M.