Though dotted with occasional surprises, the book as a whole struggles to keep readers engaged.
A brother and sister find themselves in adventurous combat in MCB’s (4 Note Chronicles of the Celestial Warriors: Legacy, 2013) fantasy sequel.
Cameron, 19, and Jordan, 18, are both looking for revenge. After their parents are killed by shades (“dark spirits that endlessly attack people”), the two join the Paladin Academy of Tear City. Their auras (“the living essence of your energy that surrounds your body”) are read, and it’s determined by the aura reader that there will be trouble down the road. Though Jordan will have to overcome her emotions, the more serious issue is with Cameron: The aura reader predicts that Cameron will eventually have to battle an inner evil—a task that he alone can complete and one that, should he fail, will turn him into a wretched creature known as a Phantom. Fighting shades and phantoms—Jordan with her pistol, Cameron with his katana—the duo eventually encounters the embodiment of Cameron’s inner evil, a pesky figure known as Loon. Though Cameron and Loon are enemies by both nature and destiny, Cameron insists that Loon accompany him on his adventures as a way to keep his adversary close. “You shall not leave my side,” Cameron tells Loon, “and when I’m ready, I promise we will fight each other.” This twist makes for an intriguing development; however, it can’t salvage the story. The convoluted actions scenes can be difficult to follow, as when a character named Clear is surprised by a mummy: “Finally Clear calmly makes his way out of the hallway. Suddenly a tall mummy like creature with dark purple glowing eyes and is wrapped in strange gauze stained in ink charges for Clear and quickly grabs Clear by the neck and slams his body up against a wall.” Elsewhere, dialogue does little but state the obvious, as when Cameron is driving and admits that he doesn’t know where he’s going: “I was just going to drive until I finally reached another town.” Unfortunately, reaching the end of this adventurous road may prove to be too challenging for most readers.
Though dotted with occasional surprises, the book as a whole struggles to keep readers engaged.Pub Date: Dec. 26, 2013
ISBN: 978-1494805319
Page Count: 158
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Feb. 26, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.
A man walks out of a bar and his life becomes a kaleidoscope of altered states in this science-fiction thriller.
Crouch opens on a family in a warm, resonant domestic moment with three well-developed characters. At home in Chicago’s Logan Square, Jason Dessen dices an onion while his wife, Daniela, sips wine and chats on the phone. Their son, Charlie, an appealing 15-year-old, sketches on a pad. Still, an undertone of regret hovers over the couple, a preoccupation with roads not taken, a theme the book will literally explore, in multifarious ways. To start, both Jason and Daniela abandoned careers that might have soared, Jason as a physicist, Daniela as an artist. When Charlie was born, he suffered a major illness. Jason was forced to abandon promising research to teach undergraduates at a small college. Daniela turned from having gallery shows to teaching private art lessons to middle school students. On this bracing October evening, Jason visits a local bar to pay homage to Ryan Holder, a former college roommate who just received a major award for his work in neuroscience, an honor that rankles Jason, who, Ryan says, gave up on his career. Smarting from the comment, Jason suffers “a sucker punch” as he heads home that leaves him “standing on the precipice.” From behind Jason, a man with a “ghost white” face, “red, pursed lips," and "horrifying eyes” points a gun at Jason and forces him to drive an SUV, following preset navigational directions. At their destination, the abductor forces Jason to strip naked, beats him, then leads him into a vast, abandoned power plant. Here, Jason meets men and women who insist they want to help him. Attempting to escape, Jason opens a door that leads him into a series of dark, strange, yet eerily familiar encounters that sometimes strain credibility, especially in the tale's final moments.
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.Pub Date: July 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
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An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
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