A somewhat predictable but still inventive fantasy-series opener.
This fantasy debut tells the story of a mercenary who’s forced from retirement by an evil horde, warlike kingdoms, and an ancient prophecy.
In the world of Wrae-Kronn, a warrior named Alaezdar has outrun his violent past and settled in Valeland. For nearly a year, he’s worked the farm of Tharn, the village’s founder. Although he’s still considered an outsider, Alaezdar is acquainted with Morlonn the Hunter, and Aaelie, the washerwoman’s daughter. He lives in fear, however, that members of Rager’s House of Renegades—his former employers—will track him down and exact vengeance for his murder of the villainous Red Blade. Also problematic is the nearby Kingdom of Triel, for which Tharn has agreed to mine iron ore that’s used to produce toxic “Goblin Touched” steel. When Ambassador Krostos demands higher productivity from the village, Tharn agrees. But to assure production, the ambassador wants to take a hostage who would live in Triel—specifically, the lovely Aaelie. Meanwhile, the prophecy of Dar Drannon, a godlike, elven being who was wounded by a fallen star, weighs heavily upon the land; Tharn believes that Dar “is in human form, but he doesn’t know who he is yet and he has not been awakened.” In this start of a new series, author McDaniel lays strong groundwork, filled with rousing concepts, such as Alaezdar’s magical sword, Bloodseeker, which can heal the hero’s wounds, and the witch Fyaa, who arrived in Wrae-Kronn via a magical gate at the supposedly defunct elven tower, Aaestfallia Keep. The dynamic between Aaelie and Rivlok, a young man who loves her dearly, adds to the tension after she confesses that Alaezdar “brings a newness, and change, and possibly adventure” to their cloistered lives. McDaniel does enjoy telegraphing plot maneuvers, as when Gartan the Dark of the Watchers Guild warns, “The 89th Bloody Fang Goblin tribe has called upon their dark god,” which will leave readers less than surprised at a later development. However, solid pacing, consistently fun inventions, and the hero’s desire to resist the “prophecy game” result in an entertaining journey.
A somewhat predictable but still inventive fantasy-series opener.Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-68433-114-7
Page Count: 338
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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