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THE COBALT DOMAIN

Name: THE COBALT DOMAIN
Author: Darla Roselle
ISBN: 978-1496055514

by Darla Roselle ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 19, 2014

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Imaginative flourishes perk up old tropes in Roselle’s debut novel, a slowly wheeling blend of intrigue, teen drama, fantasy and fun.
The Cobalt Domain, a magical land separate from yet linked to our own, is divided into nine distinct, color-coded “Darus.” Milo Davenport has spent her life studying them, looking for a way to get back to our world. She’s on her way to find a gateway home when the Yellow Daru is disturbed by the arrival of Cassandra “Casey” Campbell. The Cobalt Domain has been unstable since a despot named Pioneer began an attempt to subjugate the entire Domain under his rule. He and his minion, Shady, have the power to morph dissidents into harmless creatures. Pioneer is desperate to capture Milo so as to end her status as a secret hero and beacon of hope for the so-called Partisans he subjugates. Casey, however, just might throw a wrench in those plans, as Milo recruits her for a mission of utmost importance: to carry vital knowledge to Jake Lancaster, a fellow dissident seeking a way to save his wife and son from Pioneer. Casey will have to navigate treacherous terrain, political unrest and an alien world if she is to ever have a chance of seeing home again. Casey’s adventures are painted in fast-moving, easy-to-read prose divided into digestible chapters. Unfortunately, the story ends up too far on the side of simplicity. Dialogue often reads more as an adult’s idea of how teenagers talk—“Well…I don’t have all day to sit here and wait for you to decide whether or not I’m really a Yellow”—and the villains, Pioneer and Shady, lean toward being caricatured. The plot is smooth and the story’s nevertheless entertaining. Casey’s budding relationship, the small details of worldbuilding—calling an hour a “flux,” a glow a “month,” etc.)—and many of the minor “morph” characters stand out as particularly enjoyable.
Solid YA fantasy that, in spite of a few rough patches, should appeal to fans of the genre.

Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2014

ISBN: 978-1496055514

Page Count: 440

Publisher: CreateSpace

Review Posted Online: Dec. 4, 2014

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

SCIENCE FICTION

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MORNING STAR

From the Red Rising Trilogy series , Vol. 3

by Pierce Brown ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 9, 2016

An ambitious and satisfying conclusion to a monumental saga.

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Brown completes his science-fiction trilogy with another intricately plotted and densely populated tome, this one continuing the focus on a rebellion against the imperious Golds.

This last volume is incomprehensible without reference to the first two. Briefly, Darrow of Lykos, aka Reaper, has been “carved” from his status as a Red (the lowest class) into a Gold. This allows him to infiltrate the Gold political infrastructure…but a game’s afoot, and at the beginning of the third volume, Darrow finds himself isolated and imprisoned for his insurgent activities. He longs both for rescue and for revenge, and eventually he gets both. Brown is an expert at creating violent set pieces whose cartoonish aspects (“ ‘Waste ’em,’ Sevro says with a sneer” ) are undermined by the graphic intensity of the savagery, with razors being a favored instrument of combat. Brown creates an alternative universe that is multilayered and seething with characters who exist in a shadow world between history and myth, much as in Frank Herbert’s Dune. This world is vaguely Teutonic/Scandinavian (with characters such as Magnus, Ragnar, and the Valkyrie) and vaguely Roman (Octavia, Romulus, Cassius) but ultimately wholly eclectic. At the center are Darrow, his lover, Mustang, and the political and military action of the Uprising. Loyalties are conflicted, confusing, and malleable. Along the way we see Darrow become more heroic and daring and Mustang, more charismatic and unswerving, both agents of good in a battle against forces of corruption and domination. Among Darrow’s insights as he works his way to a position of ascendancy is that “as we pretend to be brave, we become so.”

An ambitious and satisfying conclusion to a monumental saga.

Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-345-53984-7

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine

Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015

Categories:

SCIENCE FICTION | DYSTOPIAN FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
IRON GOLD
by Pierce Brown

- BOOK REVIEW
GOLDEN SON
by Pierce Brown

- BOOK REVIEW
RED RISING
by Pierce Brown

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GOLDEN SON

From the Red Rising Trilogy series , Vol. 2

by Pierce Brown ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 6, 2015

Comparisons to The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones series are inevitable, for this tale has elements of both—fantasy, the...

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Brown presents the second installment of his epic science-fiction trilogy, and like the first (Red Rising, 2014), it’s chock-full of interpersonal tension, class conflict and violence.

The opening reintroduces us to Darrow au Andromedus, whose wife, Eo, was killed in the first volume. Also known as the Reaper, Darrow is a lancer in the House of Augustus and is still looking for revenge on the Golds, who are both in control and in the ascendant. The novel opens with a galactic war game, seemingly a simulation, but Darrow’s opponent, Karnus au Bellona, makes it very real when he rams Darrow’s ship and causes a large number of fatalities. In the main narrative thread, Darrow has infiltrated the Golds and continues to seek ways to subvert their oppressive and dominant culture. The world Brown creates here is both dense and densely populated, with a curious amalgam of the classical, the medieval and the futuristic. Characters with names like Cassius, Pliny, Theodora and Nero coexist—sometimes uneasily—with Daxo, Kavax and Sevro. And the characters inhabit a world with a vaguely medieval social hierarchy yet containing futuristic technology such as gravBoots. Amid the chronological murkiness, one thing is clear—Darrow is an assertive hero claiming as a birthright his obligation to fight against oppression: "For seven hundred years we have been enslaved….We have been kept in darkness. But there will come a day when we walk in the light." Stirring—and archetypal—stuff.

Comparisons to The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones series are inevitable, for this tale has elements of both—fantasy, the future and quasi-historicism.