Excessive jargon and a gigantic ensemble break the spell of this well-meaning fantasy novel.
The mystical exploits of Sheer’An and company continue in this fourth installment of Ponder’s Cel’mystry series (The Only Road, 2011, etc.), which is the first to credit co-author Nash.
Sheer’An lives with a makeshift family of Busshidoe warriors, former slaves, and half-humans. She is a “First One in miniature...barely taller than a Gnome,” branded by the “Wyrd mark.” The family lives by “complex codes of honesty and honor that both the First Ones and the Busshidoe follow” and are bound together by one uncanny fact: “All of us have died at least once….” They often show solidarity; when Sheer’An travels to the Island colony to buy a musical instrument and encounters a discriminatory shopkeeper, her supernatural crew assembles to defend her by “creating some Chaos.” The shopkeeper, needless to say, reconsiders. The theme of prejudice reappears when the Shaougaun, the realm’s leader, starts persecuting religious islanders. After consulting the Great God, the gang receives orders to help the mortals resist. So begins one quest. Another starts when Redbow, Sheer’An’s brother, seeks to settle a grudge against the corrupt Conservatory, but must first seek out Clove Clearwater—a man “madder than a clan of Coppers on craze weed.” These tales are told from alternating perspectives. The authors show an obvious affection for their strong-willed characters, and Cel’mystry offers a rich and detailed world. But many readers will struggle to absorb the complex genealogies and mystical taxonomies, which frequently confuse more than please. “Mallandry here was blood bonded brother to Sheer’An’s father,” one character explains, “that makes her his relative by blood as well. As for me, Sheer’An addition is one of my own.” With so many complicated ties and unanswered questions about the world itself, many readers will have a hard time understanding what’s at stake in the characters’ quests, which unfold at a leisurely pace.
Excessive jargon and a gigantic ensemble break the spell of this well-meaning fantasy novel.Pub Date: June 27, 2012
ISBN: 978-1470186425
Page Count: 334
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 4, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
A clever and inspiring reimagining of a little-remembered time and place.
Medieval history and Celtic mythology merge in an enchanting tale.
Arden, best known for her Winternight Trilogy, here turns from medieval Russia to Europe during the same period. Anne of Brittany—a real person—is 19 when the novel begins in the late 15th century, a sovereign duchess whose father, the duke, has been dead since she was a child. Described as “small and glossy as a cat in a dairy,” she’s desperately trying to avoid marrying Charles VIII, the king of France, which would mean the dissolution of her country. She conceives a plan to conduct a unicorn hunt in the ancient, haunted forest of Broceliande, thinking she will be able to secretly arrange a proxy wedding to Maximilien of Austria, heir to the Holy Roman Empire. While there, she encounters not only an actual unicorn but an evil enchanter who has designs on her kingdom. With the unlikely aid of the chivalrous (and undeniably attractive) Louis of Orleans, who has been sent by Charles’ sister Marguerite to betray Anne, as well as Anne’s spunky younger sister, Isabeau; a clever peasant girl, Elesbed; and a cat named Butter, Anne works feverishly to protect her people from sinister forces both political and supernatural. Arden takes her time immersing the reader in this thoroughly and intricately imagined world, where historical figures bump up against an enigmatic korriganed queen, at least one monstrous sea-dragon, a herd of undead “anaon,” and a whole Breton city that has been trapped in time. This is an alternate history in which the admirable Anne, freed from the confines of textbooks, gets to ask the question, “Shall we not write our own story?” Here, love and duty reach an understanding, and courtly romance makes friends with a steamier variety of physical contact. Fans of jousts, spells, dark magic, and brave women will find plenty of each here.
A clever and inspiring reimagining of a little-remembered time and place.Pub Date: June 2, 2026
ISBN: 9780593128282
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: April 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2026
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