Engaging epic fantasy reminiscent of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.
In the first installment of a planned fantasy trilogy, debut author Mitchell introduces the half-human, half-angel Lloyd, who sets off on a quest to save the world.
Lloyd is the son of a fisherman who longs for adventure; his wish comes true when his father sends him off to trade that year’s catch. In the novel’s slow beginning, Lloyd embarks on his journey upon the ship of his father’s friend, the prickly captain Mithias. During a storm, they’re forced to seek refuge on an island populated by angels, who are hostile to humans. Lloyd and Mithias would have been killed if an evil Thundrian force had not invaded, forcing the pair to the angel stronghold of Sacrimen. There, they meet Ariel, a skilled magician. Lloyd and the others learn that Thundrian forces are attacking everywhere using an inhuman army. But Lloyd, alongside Mithias, Ariel and a lizard prince named Theron, won’t allow that to happen, so they set out to save the world. The novel is rife with overwritten prose, featuring lines such as, “The next day Mithias woke me up as light began to enter the land” and “A flurry of obscurity enveloped my mind.” Dialogue is unnatural, too, as when one character asks another, “Why have you halted your advance?” That denseness can impede the narrative’s otherwise comfortably steady pace. Despite its slow start, the story is compellingly peppered with frequent action sequences as Lloyd and his crew team up with a band of dragons and battle supernatural soldiers.
Engaging epic fantasy reminiscent of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.Pub Date: March 9, 2012
ISBN: 978-0615558400
Page Count: 372
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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