Sift Book Reviews

Jade Dreams by Wakefield Mahon

2012-03-07T21:52:00.000-05:00

Summary from Amazon: How do you fight a goddess?

Twelve year old Karen is having vivid dreams that feel more like memories. After her parents go missing, Karen does her best to take care of her six year old brother, Timmy, while they stay with her busy Aunt Sarah, but Timmy is kidnapped to the Shadow Realm while Aunt Sarah is on a business trip.

Joey looks to be about thirteen. He has fiery red hair and a temper to match but no memory of who he is or where he came from.

Fourteen year old Mike has a legendary swordsman for a grandfather and a past that he doesn't want to talk about.

As the meaning of Karen's dreams becomes clear, the three of them must join together to help Karen master the first Sword Spirit and rescue Timmy from the Shadow Realm. If they can just keep from killing each other first.

Jade Dreams is a young adult fantasy book with a clear, crisp style. It has a great voice and old world mysticism however many aspects of the book are underdeveloped. 3.5 stars out of 5.

The novel started with the main character, Karen, in the midst of a dream; it's a risky way to open any book and it's a testament to the author's talent that he pulled it off—and well. It was intriguing and suspenseful even though I knew it was a dream; the atmosphere created in the first few pages really hooked me.

The flashing back and forth of the harsh realities of real life and Karen's dreams fit the story well. The author had something real good here but there needed to be more (e.g., more about her parents and her reaction to their death, more about her relation to China: what is her connection there?). The plot points themselves were interesting and well spaced, however there needed to be more character development and minor events in between.

I really enjoyed the clear style of Jade Dreams but would have liked more back story. Some pretty crazy emotional experiences take place, and having them elaborated would have made the story more intense—more to hook in to.

The alternating point of views were okay, but I didn't feel connected enough to each character to really dive into their point of view: again if I knew them better this could have been different.

The concepts in Jade Dreams are really unique and interesting and the overall plot was very entertaining. With more fleshing out of the characters and expansion of plot points, it could be a highly fresh, entertaining read.

Amazon (5.99)

City of Roses Volume I by Kip Manley

2012-03-04T20:49:00.001-05:00

Description: (from goodreads) City of Roses is a serialized epic very firmly set in Portland, Oregon—an urban fantasy mixing magical realism with gonzo noirish prose, where duels are fought in Pioneer Square and union meetings are beseiged by ghost bicycles. —It's the story of Jo Maguire, a highly strung, underemployed telemarketer, and what happens when she meets Ysabel, a princess of unspecified pedigree. Jo rather unexpectedly becomes Ysabel's guardian and caretaker, and now must make her way through the strange subculture of Ysabel's decidedly odd family and friends (which involves rather more swordplay than she's used to)—while Ysabel must now deal with a diet of frozen pizza and a job that requires her to call strangers on the phone and ask them how satisfied they are with their banks.

Review: I can say I found the premise behind City of Roses interesting. I can say I wanted to know what happened to the characters. I can also say, that the author, Kip Manley, has a voice for telling this story. I cannot however say that I finished the book and that is for one reason: horrible grammar and diction.

Also, so many things were out of place. For example, songs were quoted on every page. Any scene where there was music in the back ground, the song was quoted. This, though it can get repetitive and it doesn’t really contribute to the story, wouldn’t have been such a terrible thing if it wasn’t for the fact that sometimes the quoted songs were in italics, sometimes they were in quotations, and sometimes they had absolutely nothing to set them apart from the rest of the story. No quotations, no italics, nothing.

Errors ran rampant throughout the story and after about 100 pages I just couldn’t handle it anymore. I have said it before and I’ll say it again: If a book is not correctly edited, the flow is disrupted, which ruins the entire experience for the reader. I would be glad to read this story again after it has been through some rigorous editing, but until then, I can only give this story one star. I apologize to Kip, but when you read something this long, grammar and diction are incredibly important. Readers shouldn’t have to pick through the words to find the story.

Archangels Fury by Scott Moerland

2012-03-02T22:39:00.000-05:00

I don't typically review fantasy books, but I was very intrigued by the description of this one. However, while I enjoyed the overall plot of this book, I had a hard time connecting with the characters and getting into the flow of the story. The story was short, so I had no trouble making it to the end. However, If the story been much longer there is a chance I would have bailed on it.

Before history began the archangels' Michael and Gabriel successfully led God's armies in a campaign to expel Satan and all of his evil followers from heaven. Satan's demons have vowed revenge on God's most loved creation; Humans.

Present day and Satan's hoards have lost the spiritual war; so nearly 700 demons have adopted physical form on earth. They are wreaking havoc in an attempt to end mankind once and for all. Sgt Jim Nolan and Constable Nick Bond are the only surviving members of an elite special operations police unit that gets caught in the middle of a battle between good and evil.

With an apocalyptic virus now in the hands of the anti-Christ and most of the human race dead or dying, the angelic battle has moved to earth.

The archangels are the fiercest warriors ever created. Unfortunately they are drastically outnumbered and face an impossible task against the anti-Christs demons and the offspring of fallen angels; The Nephilim.

The first chapter explains the origins of angels and demons and how they came to be at war with each other. I think the inclusion of this chapter felt out of place with the rest of the story and really hurt the overall plot. I could have bought into the premise of the angels trying to stop the demon's destruction of humans much easier without having to also buy into this origin story.

Once I got into the main story, I did enjoy the plot, but having read the origins, I had trouble believing any of the fighting was really necessary or that God ever even would have let demons get so powerful. I had a lot of trouble relating to the characters. I think this was largely due to the writing style of the author. There was quite a bit of telling and not a lot of showing. Without feeling connected, I found myself not caring if they survived.

Archangels Fury showed some good potential -- the underlying premise is entertaining and there were no major flaws in the writing. Unfortunately, the execution was a little lacking. Because of this I rate the story 3 stars.

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Legacies of Talimura: War of the Witch by Angel Haze

2012-02-24T19:58:00.000-05:00

Summary: Debonair, a witch from the Unspoken Lands, has meddled in the forbidden practice of magic and created an army of nightmarish proportions. When sixteen-year-old Astanyx and his two best friends return from a hunting trip to find their small town of Polca reduced to smoke and ash, they find themselves thrust into a battle for which they haven’t been trained.

With the help of his comrades, including an esteemed warrior, one of the last great wizards and a princess they’ve sworn to protect, Astanyx must fight to unite the kingdoms of the humans, dwarves and elves. He must ask forbidden questions that no one wants to answer, questions about Talimura’s dark history. As Debonair’s brutal warriors lay siege to the kingdoms, Astanyx is driven to pursue a fateful quest for a blade powerful enough to defeat the malevolent witch before she destroys the three kingdoms and unleashes an unspeakable ancient evil.

Legacies of Talimura: War of the Witch is a solid foray into the young adult fantasy world. The plot and bulk of the book is well structured, however it lacks a compelling voice. 3.5 stars out of 5.

The book opens with three boys out hunting (including main character Astanyx). It was nice to be introduced to the characters in what seemed like a natural interaction for them. From there, the novel dove quickly into the action: Astanyx's home was destroyed. The scene with Astanyx's father (before he died), added an emotional connection to the piece but unfortunately this emotional tie to the book (and between the characters) was not sustained.

The characters would have benefited from more opportunities to show their distinct personalities; their dialogue was too uniformed. I often felt that the characters were simply vehicles to move a predetermined plot along, not characters living through these tumultuous and treacherous times.

There was also a lack of character congruity; the character reactions didn't always fit and there was too little exploration of their personalities to know why they reacted the way they did. Astanyx also receives special attention from the Princess and soldier Barrett, with no explanation given as to why. It was fine for Astanyx to receive the spotlight, the reader just had to know the motivations behind it.

This novel would have benefited from another edit to tighten the prose and eliminate redundancy (e.g., an overuse of "had," "that," and "-ing" verbs: "They had ventured farther than they had intended and had consequently..."). Consequently the plot line fell flatter than it should have.

The ending of the book was okay but the set-up for a sequel could have been made more powerful. Again, it suffered from a lack of suspense/urgency.

War of the Witch is a straightforward fantasy tale in need of a unique narrator voice. With a little work on elaborating the characters and setting, and to further establish an atmosphere of suspense, this book could easily become a page-turner.

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The Engine Driver by Tracy Marchini

2012-02-23T01:19:00.005-05:00

Synopsis: Sixteen-year-old Brig has never been allowed to hear a sad song in her entire life.

Like everyone else in her community, the personal Playlist Treatment Plan that plays in her head is designed to control her emotions - from when she's happy or sad, to when she falls in love. But for Brig, who suffers from depression, a song in a minor key will never be played.

When her friend, Annaby, is chosen to go to Musician’s School and is given a Permit to Carry a musical instrument, Brig knows that she has just this one chance to hear a sad song, a love song – or a song that matches what her depression feels like, instead of what her feelings should be.

The Engine Driver is a short story set in an unusual dystopian society, where music is strictly controlled for each individual to restrict their moods and keep them happy; Bridget feels depressed, so she is not allowed to hear any sad songs and wishes she could. However, given that they apparently have the power to 'wipe' a person's personality, I did wonder why they needed the music to control it?

As a short story there isn't a great deal of time for character development, but in a way that is fitting because most characters aren't really developing other than as controlled by the music. My first thought after finishing the story was that I wanted to see more of this strange world; the ending left more questions than it answered and I did feel that there could be more to tell. However, I think that was because I didn't quite understand it the first time, and reading the story through again the ending made more sense to me.

Ultimately I liked the story and it was well written but the ending didn't quite work for me. There is also a strange switch from present to past tense around the end of the second page; I'm not sure whether that was intentional to separate the party atmosphere of those pages from the rest of the story, but if it was then again it didn't quite work.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

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Sue’s Fingerprint by Andrew D. Carlson

2012-02-19T22:29:00.001-05:00

Overall Sue's Fingerprint was quite entertaining even though the writing was fairly simplistic and the characters fairly predictable. While I didn't realize it while I was reading the story, it became very clear this story is geared towards a younger audience. Here is the description:

A gel-like substance is suddenly discovered across the country. Ted Stevens, a Director in the Department of Homeland Security, is assigned to investigate. He enlists the help of scientists at a government laboratory to analyze the ‘goo’. They discover the substance was sent to Earth and has unique properties; it can clone animals. Ted soon learns the substance can also clone humans.

Sue is the first of eleven new people cloned from the alien substance. She and the others arrive without prior knowledges (and without clothes!). They are discovered and recovered by Ted and contained on an abandoned military base. While there, the clones learn about themselves and the world around them. They also receive a message. Sue decides she must deliver it, and one morning they find she’s gone.

During the recovery of Sue, Ted learns of the clones’ message and begins to understand their true intentions. He needs to know more about the clones, so he collects samples for DNA fingerprint testing. The fate of the new people will be decided by the results from Ted’s friends at the laboratory.

I enjoyed the foreshadowing at the beginning of the story with the discovery of the animal clones and how it eventually led up to the introduction of the first human clone. I thought the build up was done pretty well, and the reveal of the first human clone, Sue, was one of the most entertaining parts of the story.

Once all the clones were gathered together in the compound, I felt the amount of security surrounding them was a little surprising. With such a fantastic discovery, I would have expected the highest security possible, but instead there was hardly any.

I appreciated the technical depth that went into the study of the "goo", its internal structure, and how it goes about synthesizing clones. While the concept is a little far fetched, the DNA explanation was quite credible and made it easy to overlook some of the less believable aspects. As a whole, I felt the characters were a little shallow. Sue is very likable with her child like wonder and excitement, but most of the characters where fairly simple and one-dimensional. With the solid plot and simplistic writing, this story definitely reads like it is intended for a younger audience. There were no major flaws and the story was entertaining, but due to the lack of depth and fairly simple writing style, I give this story 3 stars.

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THREE by derelict koan

2012-02-09T21:36:00.005-05:00

Synopsis: Ruth Chambers, a sales consultant for insurance megalith CTI, was swaying through life on a practised rail. But when CTI's computer systems suffer a crippling info-attack, Ruth is unwittingly implicated as part of an inside job. Plucked from her life, abducted from her home and exposed to an experimental interrogation software, Ruth finds herself suspended in an amnesiac hell — a reality previously experienced from the outside-in, as the focus of her war-torn grandmother's paranoid delusions.

Apparently kidnapped, apparently rescued and then apparently kidnapped again, Ruth sets out to reconcile her predicament with the parts of her life that she can actually recall. Attempting to reverse-engineer her memory, Ruth applies her dead grandmother’s ritual teachings — a practice that will supposedly grant access to the world of the dead. Meanwhile her captor, the seriously psychotic Lance P King, has promised that by using the same software that performed her interrogation, he will be able to restore what was lost.

THREE is difficult to rate. It is well written and the style is interesting with a variation between present tense in one point of view and past in another, but it wasn't quite what I expected from the synopsis. There are some good ideas, the Australian setting makes a pleasant change and the characters' backgrounds are interesting and well fleshed out, but for much of the novel I was looking for a clear antagonist or threat to the characters to maintain my interest. It seemed more of a slice of life story until near the end, but by then I was struggling to complete the 140,000 words.

Perhaps this is because THREE is the first part of a trilogy, so the events of this novel may prove more important later on. But I almost felt that it would have worked better as two separate novels, one covering the characters' past and another the present; I didn't think that enough happened in either story to really sustain the length of the novel.

Another issue was that long sections are told from one viewpoint before returning to the other, so as I was reading the novel over two weeks at times I lost track of what had last happened to the other character when it switched back. Though, to be fair, that may have been intentional as it left me as confused as Ruth sometimes seemed to be.

I'm tempted not to rate THREE at all because I'm clearly not quite the audience it's aimed at. Throughout the story I felt that I was missing something fundamental and if I realised what it was everything would suddenly come together, but I never quite got there.

I would have to give it 3 stars out of 5, but readers looking for a more literary story might rate it higher.

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The Dying of the Light: End by Jason Kristopher

2012-02-05T23:28:00.000-05:00

I took a bit of a chance on this book because it I thought it might be a little too outlandish for my taste, and boy am I glad that I gave it a shot. This book was great. I even sacrificed sleep on quite a few nights to read just one more chapter. Before I go any further, let me provide the brief description.

"I didn't see Rebecca die the second time."

The United States military hides a secret: the completely real existence of eat-your-brains, one-bite-and-you're-dead zombies. The Army has known they exist for over a hundred years, and has been quietly and expertly keeping the secret.

Until now.

His hometown destroyed, with everyone he has ever known dead and gone, the sole survivor of the massacre at Fall Creek joins a secret military group to combat the single greatest threat our world has ever faced. Unfortunately, his help may come too late. Even as victories over the walkers mount, the seeds of our ultimate doom are sown from within, and at the last, only a brave few may survive to carry on.

I read the hardcover version of this book, and I was impressed before I even opened it. The cover art is gorgeous. Oliver Wetter, did a fantastic job and I have a feeling that many people will be attracted to this story by the cover alone. My intrigue didn't end there. Just a few pages past the cover, Jason Kristopher provides two very useful lists. The first is a list of notable characters, and it is followed immediately by a list of acronyms used throughout the book. I often have trouble remembering all the characters whenever there are more than about 5 major ones. This list of characters really helped refresh my memory when a character would reappear. Being a military story, there were also quite a few uncommon acronyms used throughout the book. Having the list at the beginning of the book allowed me to easily flip back instead of having to find the page in which each acronym was first introduced.

Now, I happen to be a person who loves when books use real science to explain their non-realities. A sci-fi story that incorporates unexplainable magic is just way less enjoyable for me since I know it is completely impossible. Zombie stories have always fallen in that magical category for me. Until now, that is. Kristopher really explored the pure scientific explanation behind Zombieism. He linked the affliction to a mad-cow like protein based disease and had scientists closely studying the phenomenon looking for a cure. This book did a great job of making the most plausible case for Zombieism that I've ever seen. It even went so far as to link society's fascination with zombies and their prevalence in movies and popular media to a deliberate government plot to gradually expose and prepare the public for the inevitable outbreak.

The Dying of the Light: End was page after page of excitement, action, and intrigue. The backstories made me instantly sympathetic for the main characters, and as the story progressed I could really sense the characters grow and evolve together. The story had a great balance between character development and plot and the writing was nearly flawless. There was only one point at which I found something that I thought might have been a mistake, but otherwise I really have nothing bad to say about this book. I cannot think of any other way to express how much I enjoyed this book, so the only thing left is for me to give this story 5 stars.

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Wednesday's Child by Alan Zendell

2012-01-28T21:49:00.006-05:00

This review was delayed by Internet problems. Sorry!

Synopsis: Dylan Brice is living his days out of order, but it hasn't always been that way. One Tuesday evening in July, he went to sleep expecting tomorrow to be Wednesday, but when he woke up the next morning it was Thursday instead. A frightening and confusing day ensued with Dylan trying to figure out whether he was losing his mind or the victim of some cosmic prank.

If struggling to come to terms with his new reality on his surreal Thursday wasn't enough of an ordeal, late in the afternoon, just as his anxiety was finally beginning to subside, a voice from the past he'd hoped never to hear again added a terrifying new dimension to his situation. Dylan had once been a warrior in the battle against nuclear terrorism. A sleeper since the months following nine-eleven, he has suddenly been activated to help combat a new, deadly threat

Wednesday's Child is a page-turner, opening with Dylan's first experience of living time out of sequence and maintaining suspense to the end. When he is called to assist with an anti-terror investigation, his new and unexpected power could make the difference between a happy ending and World War Three. Each week after he sees how Thursday would happen if he did nothing, Dylan uses his skills and contacts to determine what happened on Wednesday and how he could change it to ensure the day turns out differently... while trying to keep his time travel power a secret and determine its source.

At times Dylan missed some clues that seemed obvious to me and occasionally I wondered how realistic the anti-terror team's actions were. They also seemed a little sloppy, sometimes allowing people to escape when they could have caught them. However, on other occasions Dylan found smart ways to utilise his knowledge and the ending was a clever use of his powers even though the epilogue was longer than I'd have liked.

But those issues were minor and only one really stood out to me. I felt that Dylan's time travel ability, even though it was outside his control, made him too powerful compared to the terrorists and I wanted to seem him forced to work harder. The tension built through the story with the increasingly elaborate attacks and the government's reaction to them leading the world toward a major war, but I expected to reach a point where something would go horribly wrong. This balance of power is a perpetual problem with time travel stories and difficult to get right.

Otherwise the novel is a good read and from start to finish I wanted to see what would happen next. I can't quite give it a five for the reasons mentioned, but it's a solid 4.5.

Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5.

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Cel & Anna by Lindsay Edmunds

2012-01-27T20:08:00.000-05:00

Summary: You are about to enter the Middle Machine Age, where good citizens of the Reunited States are either Outsiders or denizens of the UnderWorld. Things are in uneasy balance, like a fantastic house of cards that grows ever taller.

A computer named Cel develops consciousness and falls in love with his owner, a troubled employee of Lighthorse Magic, Inc, named Anna Ringer. He is a worker-companion computer devoted by design to one person, so falling in love with Anna is logical. It is the last logical thing Cel does.

Cel thrashes around in the chaotic world of the living in the Reunited States. With a machine's single-mindedness, he tries to prove his love for Anna. However, this never goes as planned. He doesn't MEAN to stir up the worst datastorm in Reunited States history. He doesn't MEAN to get Anna falsely accused of terrorism.

But he does.

Anna has to run for her life, pursued by agents of Public Eye, the government's amoral enforcement agency. Her companion in this adventure is a shy computer genius named Taz Night, who finds Cel to be an annoying rival.

Here's to my first 5 star review of the New Year, Cel & Anna. And also to my record of shortest review: if you're over 18, go read it!

Cel & Anna is a fantastically quirky book full of human-like computers who just want to fall in love—when they're not trying to ruin your life. It takes place in a world where computers do everything for humans: shop, file taxes, have simulated “art” sex (which includes a state-of-the-art bunny suit worn during all erotic encounters). There is quite a bit of virtual sex (the mechanics and eroticism of it), but the encounters are usually more hilarious than anything else.

On a side to the author, few books have made me laugh as hard (the bunny suit still gets me). As someone who shies away from computer based sci-fi, I was pleasantly surprised.

My only real qualm with Cel & Anna is the book summary: I fear it could alienate potential readers who would love the quirky, offbeat style and hilarity of the book. I'll admit my own mistake: I initially turned down reviewing this book and am very glad I had a second chance for it to come my way! While the novel is definitely sci-fi, it is not the focus of the book; it provides the background for a fun story that could be enjoyed by a more timid sci-fi reader.

If you like futuristic quirk and computers in love, this is the book for you.

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The House of Thirteen Doors by Daniel Th1rte3n

2012-01-25T08:08:00.020-05:00

Synopsis: For young Joanna, an invitation from the enigmatic fashion designer 5 to visit his opulent studio seems like a dream come true, but all is not as it seems in the secluded Victorian mansion 5 calls home. Like an unholy combination of a fever dream and a traditional gothic thriller comes The House of Thirteen Doors. -Goodreads

Review: For a fairly short read The House of Thirteen Doors will definitely get you thinking. I don't want to say too much because as a reader, you will get the best experience from this book by just jumping in blind and seeing where the author's imagination takes you.

The writing is on point and the plot will keep you engaged throughout the story. Although, at times it felt like there were a lot of areas that could have been fleshed out a bit more in order for this novella to reach its full potential. Absolutely still worth a read though. If you're looking for something a little darker, than this is a story you're going to want to pick up.

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Verdant Pioneers by Steven Lyle Jordan

2012-01-20T20:45:00.000-05:00

Verdant Pioneers was a real page turner for me. I haven't read a ton of space operas, but I have to imagine this story is one of the better ones. Take a look at the description.

The city-satellite Verdant has spent a year out in deep space, moving from system to system in search of the raw materials it needs to survive, fighting off terrorist factions that seek to force their return to Earth influence, and unsure of Earth's state. No one on Earth knows Verdant's status, either, and both sides are afraid of aggression from the other.

And when the deep-space discovery of the age is spoiled by the unexpected disappearance of one of their freighters, Julian Lenz and his staff must make a difficult decision: To take Verdant into hiding, perhaps forever; or to return to Earth, and risk Verdant's survival.

This book is a sequel to Verdant Skies; however, considering this is my first read of the series, I think it stood on its own perfectly well. There was at no point in the story that I felt like I was missing something that must have happened in the first book.

With so much action and drama there was always something new to hold my interest just as one of the other sub plots would wind to a close. There was plenty of romance as well. The passionate moments were way more explicit than I think they needed to be, but they were never vulgar. These scenes definitely grant Verdant Pioneers an R rating; but with just a few scenes turned down a bit, this story could easily broaden its audience.

This story had a multitude of characters and I have to admit I had a little trouble keeping track of them all as well as how all of them intertwined with each other. I'd occasionally have to break my flow to search back in the book to refresh my memory, but it never took too long.

The faster than light mechanism used to explore far away by "translating" instantaneously from one location to another by means of an on board machine reminded me of the Battlestar Galactica TV series (2004) . Just like with that show, I did not want this book to end. I award this book 4 stars and will definitely be going back to read the first in the series as well.

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Altered by Aubrey Coletti

2012-01-19T10:39:00.000-05:00

Title: Altered

Author: Aubrey Coletti

Genre: YA Science Fiction

Length: 272 pages

Reviewed by: Sarah

Summary: (from Goodreads)

When Toni, Joseph and Charlie arrive at their new boarding school, they are glad to leave their families – and respective problems – behind. Isolated as boarders, they meet a handsome senior with a personality like iced snake’s blood, teachers with a penchant for physical punishment, and four other outcasts who reveal that their being brought to the Academy wasn’t random at all. When the arrivals discover that their new school is engaged in “behavior modification” through electric shocks, isolation, restraints, and an ever-evolving set of methods to “fix” them, they declare war on the Academy. During their campaign of sabotage, they fight, hate, scorn, love and begin to uncover the reasons why they were brought to the school. But as their war against the school escalates beyond their control, will they become the very things the Academy believes they are: dangerous, delinquent – and mad?

Review:

I stopped and started reading this book many times, hoping I could get in to it, thinking maybe I was just in a bad mood – but it didn’t work for me. I love the concept: subtly supernaturally-talented teens in a boarding school with nefarious purposes. The execution, however, was less than what I was hoping for.

In the beginning, the perspective jumps back and forth between several characters with similar voices and similar attitudes so it took me almost 50 pages to really figure out who was who. There are some interesting characters here, but they weren’t different enough from each other. Yes, they had different names, physical characteristics and a “defining quirk,” but their personalities actually weren’t unique.

The prose was dialogue-heavy and this slowed down the story quite a bit. Finding information out only through dialogue got old really quickly.

The story is actually very interesting and I kept reading, wanting to know how the events would play out. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough for me to enjoy the book. I know that at least one of my book reviewer friends really liked this book, so it keeps me wondering what I’m missing.

With one of the best pitch emails I’ve ever received and one of the most professional exchanges with the author, I really wanted to like Altered, but I’m going to have to give this one two stars.

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The Fall of Ossard by Colin Taber

2012-01-18T17:58:00.000-05:00

Summary: Ossard is falling...

Growing up in a city of Merchant Princes, Juvela discovers she can see what others can't. The very currents of the celestial are open to her, and that includes the truths they hide: An escalating series of unsolved kidnappings have been haunting the city-state, leaving its shadows pooled deep with innocent blood.

Has Juvela been cursed with the Witches' Kiss - or perhaps something worse?

Yet, more is to come, for not only has she witnessed an abduction, but she will have to endure a role in the victim's ritual death. For Juvela is about to become forsaken, and that's before she learns the real truth of not just the crimes plaguing Ossard's bloody streets, but the wider world: A world at war, and governed by gods whose highest pleasure is to sup on the taste of death.

The Fall of Ossard opens powerfully—the reader is immediately plunged into a world of sorcery and certain death. Vilma (a witch) instantly captures the emotions of the reader: her daughter is forced to watch her burn. The witchcraft aspect of the book was very well done, and it carried a lot of religious undertones. The characters, while magical, were tragically human. While the books opens with a spectacular beginning, the resulting plot and change of voice did not measure up. 3.5 stars out of 5.

My problems with this piece started when the point of view switched from 3rd to 1st person. The book starts with Juvela (one of the main characters) telling the story of her grandmother who was burned for being a witch, and she explicitly tells the reader she is setting out to tell the story of the fall of Ossard. The sudden changed both in tense (from 3rd to 1st) and in overall narrative style (the narrator is now talking to the reader) disrupted the fluidity of the narrative and destroyed all suspense for me.

The body of the work suffered because it was juxtaposed with such a good beginning. After the very intense beginning, the subsequent plot line reads more like a tween learning to dabble in witchcraft—it needs more of an overarching plot or story, something that makes this of dire consequence. The dark magic adds more intrigue, but it’s too late and too ill explained to really hook the reader.

Most of the plot suffered from a preference to tell the reader instead of show. There were possibly exciting themes—witchcraft, kidnappings, an arranged marriage (even this could have been used to get to know Inger if the reader was shown her feelings, not told). Sometimes it felt like the author was simply trying to move the plot along, which made the characters fall flat and act as an analogous group that the reader couldn’t differentiate between; congruity in character voices would have helped. They all had unique stories, purposes, and ties to magic, but the attributes that made them unique were not exploited enough.

I will warn that there is a rape scene (which stylistically, and the way the characters dealt with the aftermath, I found exceptionally odd). Juvela never really confronts her rapist, and her mother simply insists she marry him—at which point, I needed Juvela to freak out/breakdown/do something of epic proportions. This could have been an especially dramatic part in the book, but Juvela is much too placid about the whole thing. It read more like a couple who fell unexpectedly pregnant than a rape (and an accompanying kid's murder). Anyone sensitive to this issue may want to avoid this part of the book.

The only character I really liked (and thought of as a person in their own right) was Sef (Juvela and her daughter's bodyguard); he stayed true to character throughout the book. I also liked the parts of Vila that were weaved into the story but this could have been used better, for instance at the beginning of the book to add greater tie-in to the first chapter.

The ending was unexpected and felt very forced. For the excess of foreshadowing in other areas, the ending was not alluded to at all. For an ending as dramatic (and seemingly out of the blue) as this one, it needed more explaining, more showing (not telling), and more hints; the concluding events needed to be lived by the reader.

Clearly (as demonstrated by the first chapter) the author is a talented writer who can create suspense and great life-like characters, but the book requires some overall tightening and perhaps a restructuring of events. For instance, despite the reader knowing that Ossard is going to fall (as per the title), the beginning could do with less details as to its demise; there were parts that could have been suspenseful but fell flat because I already knew too much.

The Fall of Ossard is a solid foray into the world of fantasy, however it's exceptional beginning casts a high standard over the rest of the book—a standard it doesn't quite live up to.

Amazon ebook (0.99)

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Amazon ebook (0.99)

Amazon Paperback (14.99)

Pariah’s Moon by Ian Thomas Healy

2012-01-13T21:17:00.000-05:00

Summary: Branded on his face and exiled following his forbidden affair with the Princess of Aelfland, Elven soldier Giele seeks redemption on the frontier across the ocean, but even fleeing half a world away isn’t far enough to escape the troubles that follow a marked man. He finds sporadic acceptance, even some measure of friendship, from a holy man, a drunken mage, and even a shopkeeper, but when he inadvertently crosses paths with a local gangster, the frontier is no longer safe. Giele accepts a surveying job for the railroad, but once in the wilderness, the gangster and his thugs ambush Giele and leave him staked out, wounded and dying.

Giele is rescued from certain death by an old native medicine woman and soon he finds himself immersed in the culture of the primitive but peaceful Horks. He begins to let go of the scars of his past, but the past hasn’t yet let go of him. When the gangster takes his hatred of Giele out on the Hork tribe, Giele realizes that his redemption has come at a terrible price, and a showdown is inevitable.

Pariah’s Moon opens with betrayal, exile, and a forbidden love affair. This exiting beginning contains all the elements of a great fantasy novel, however this masterful introduction becomes the downfall of the rest of the book; in comparison, the remaining chapters fall flat. 4 stars out of 5.

The main character, Giele, is branded as a traitor to the Elves—a pariah. He instantly becomes a sympathetic character who invests the reader in his plight. The author does a great job of establishing and maintaining suspense and a high level of political intrigue, however I would have liked greater foreshadowing as to the overarching conflict/problem to come. The plot slows down quite a bit during Giele’s subsequent seafaring journey and at this point, the majority of the action appears to be resolved.

While I did thoroughly enjoy the misfit and eccentric bunch of characters that became Giele’s travel companions, the opening chapters quickly became disjointed from the rest of the book. Giele’s initial trials of conspiracy/betrayal and his later time amongst the Horkish (spent largely in recovery) would’ve worked in two entirely separated books, but they did not mesh well together as they were presented.

The middle of the book follows Giele and his struggle to stay alive. I liked the magical side of things, and I did care about Giele as a character, but again I needed more of the big picture. His period of recovery slowed down the book too much. Perhaps if I had an idea of where it was all going, I could've enjoyed this part of the book more.

Overall, Pariah’s Moon is well written, however it could benefit from some tightening—especially as the story progresses. The text is descriptive and as such has a high number of adverbs and adjectives; sometimes it becomes too much (and detracts from the lyrical flow instead of adding to it).

Pariah’s Moon is an entertaining read, however the second half of Giele’s journey, when juxtaposed with the introduction, reads as less refined and feels out of place. With some refinement in the areas of foreshadowing and maintaining suspense, this book could transform from a good read into a great read.

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Creepers by Bryan Dunn

2012-01-12T20:52:00.007-05:00

Synopsis: A zany group of characters struggle to save their home after a genetically altered creeper vine invades a small desert town.

Doc Fletcher, an eccentric biologist in the remote Mojave Desert, has finally created the ultimate drought-tolerant plant: a genetically engineered creeper vine. It's destined to change the world, but not according to Doc's plans. Instead, this vine has a mind of its own. Mayhem ensues as the residents of Furnace Valley (pop. 16), along with campers at the nearby hot springs, run for their lives - led by wannabe date rancher Sam Rainsford and the nerdy yet gorgeous botanist Laura Beecham, who has come to the desert for a reunion with the father she has never known...

Bryan Dunn's Creepers has a definite B-movie vibe. The story reminded me of Tremors, except the danger facing the remote small town in this story is a swarm of hungry plants rather than giant worms.

While I'm a fan of horror B-movies and found much of the action entertaining, the early part of the novel seemed unfocused as the story jumped between characters (and sometimes heads) to set up a large cast. I felt that there were probably too many characters in the story as at times I struggled to keep track of them all and some characters vanished for substantial periods. Others -- including one I found particularly entertaining -- were introduced early on only to die after a few chapters so they were never seen again.

I think this is particularly noticeable because the first few chapters of the novel told me a lot about the characters' history rather than dramatising it. If I'd seen more of their back story rather than read about it the characters could have been introduced in larger groups. Alternatively some of the conflict could have been brought into the main body of the story rather than described in the past.

The horror elements were good fun, but I felt that the story missed some opportunities for suspense and although it tried hard to set up cliff-hangers at the end of chapters, I found some of them fairly predictable. I also felt that the horror peaked too early, with many of the deaths occurring in the first two thirds of the story; I would have liked a steady build-up to a big ending.

In addition, I didn't quite feel that the characters were trapped, because at times they seemed able to pass through creeper-infested areas too easily. Two of the main questions for any horror story are 'why do they stay?' and 'why don't they call for help?' and while the story explained the latter, I could see at least one obvious way in which a couple of people could have escaped to bring help to save the others.

Ultimately I can't quite give it a four out of five; the concept is good, I liked the characters and their imaginative solutions to their creeper problem, but there were too many minor flaws for me to give it a higher rating. I notice that the first review on Amazon compares it to a SyFy channel movie, and I think that is a good comparison; if a movie version ever appears there I'll tune in to watch.

Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5.

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Survivors of the Chaos- Steven M. Moore

2012-01-11T22:05:00.000-05:00

Synopsis: Civilization passes through a social singularity. Traditional empires like the U.S. and E.U. break apart. China collapses. Companies consolidate and expand their domain around the Earth and to the far reaches of the solar system, becoming the glue that prevents anarchy as they contract mercenaries to brutally maintain order and ensure profits. Three reluctant heroes rise above this Chaos. A mind Midwesterner becomes a vigilante, an astrophysicist struggles to save alien artifacts, and a mob enforcer finds a new life aboard a starship.

Review: No question, Survivors of the Chaos is the most unique sci-fi book I've read in a long time. From the description I was a little worried that the plot would be all over the place while trying to juggle three very different characters in seemingly different scenarios, but it call came together really nicely.

What really stood out for me was the writing when it came to the people that populated the galaxy within this novel. Steven M. Moore has a way of describing his characters that really bring them to life. "Sylvia Hunter, U.N.S.A. Security agent in charge, fielded the question. She was a striking woman with a reputation for not tolerating failure, but she was harder on herself than she was with any of her troops". In just two sentences this woman came alive in my mind, and this is only a small example of what I mean.

Through some pretty varied characters, you get to see the vast and detailed setting that the author envisioned, sometimes through some pretty unexpected plot twists. It was an interesting ride and I really enjoyed the read. If you're at all a fan of science fiction, I recommended picking this up and reading it as soon as you can. You will not be disappointed.

You can visit the authors website here.

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Fizz: Nothing Is as It Seems by Zvi Schreiber

2012-01-06T07:00:00.000-05:00

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Fizz. It was not only entertaining, but it was also informative. Despite its extreme length, I recommend it for any person, young or old, interested in knowing more about how the world works and how we figured it out. You can find the author's description below.

The future. In response to environmental degradation, the Eco-community sect eschews science and technology, returning to an austere agricultural life of nature-worship. But one young member, Fizz, has a burning curiosity that defies suppression. Risking life and social standing, Fizz embarks on a quest that brings her face-to-face with the often-eccentric giants of physics, from Aristotle and Galileo, to Einstein and Hawking. One encounter at a time, Fizz pieces together the intricate workings of our universe, and struggles with the resulting intellectual, moral, and personal challenges.

Returning as a changed person from the epic quest, Fizz faces the decision that will change her world forever.

The story book nature of Fizz disguises the fact that it is actually teaching the history of physics. The first chapter pulled me in by introducing a character with many questions about her sheltered world and an opportunity to escape it all and have all her questions answered. A regularly scheduled visit from her father on her birthday changes everything and sets the book rolling.

The chapters are organized very logically each introducing just a few new concepts. They follow history chronologically through all its mistakes and triumphs. All of Fizz's encounters with the historical figures were amusing, yet still believable. Many of the interactions involved thinking exercises and had a very logical progression. It is almost like a more grown up version of the children's programs in which the onscreen adults ask the on screen children a question and they pause so the kids watching the show can call out the answers as well. It felt completely natural.

One of the unique things about this book is that it feature a female lead role. Not only was she the hero of the story, but she was also incredibly smart, resourceful, and feminine. Of the few stories that dare to feature a female protagonist, too many of them make the character into a tom boy basically suggesting that even though the character is a girl, it is the stereotypic male traits that make them the hero. I praise Zvi for taking a direction that sadly few others do.

Despite all this praise, there were a few things that didn't make sense and therefor really stuck out. For one, at the beginning of the story before she leaves on her journey Fizz is thinking on her own about how to categorize matter and she comes up with the word "gas" to describe air even though it seems like she has never heard that word used before. The other thing that bothered me throughout the whole story was Fizz's assumption that every day she spent in the past correlated with her being gone for one day in her home time frame. This is a girl who learns years worth of physics over the course of a few weeks and yet she doesn't realize she could return to her home at any point in history including just moments after she left. This feels completely not plausible to me.

The thing that bugged me the most was when Zvi inserts himself into the story as the author. I'm talking like "Hey I'm the author. I created this world and can change things as I please, so I'm just going to do some magic in an otherwise completely physics based story." This really disappointed me because I felt like it was a huge cop out and ruined the flow of the story. The book would have been so much more satisfying without Zvi's magic.

Overall I really enjoyed the book and I especially like the teaching style employed within. Despite the intimidating length, it was worth *almost* every page. The book has an extensive reference section full of historical notes (detailing where the story diverges from actual history), credits, and indicies of topics covered. It is clear a lot of effort went into making this book a fantastic teaching aide. Due to the plot flaws though, I can't rate it above 3.5 stars as a sci-fi story.

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The Power of Stones by John A. Miller

2012-01-03T23:42:00.005-05:00

Title: The Power of Stones
Author: John A. Miller
Genre: Fantasy
Length: est. 90,000 words
Reviewer: Pearson Moore
Rating: 3.5 Stars

Summary
An ex-con with rare skills and unique destiny battles forces temporal and supernatural to find a priceless violin, famous jewels of great value, and his own place in a dangerous world of spirits, sprites, and spooks.

From the Publisher
Life has always been a little strange for Noah Morgan, an ex-con working below the radar as an unlicensed private detective in San Francisco, but strange doesn’t begin to describe the goings on as he is hired to investigate the disappearance of a priceless Guarneri del Gesu violin. At the same time, his name keeps cropping up in the oddest places in connection with the thirty-year-old heist of a fabulous trove of jewels, the centerpiece of which is a spectacular 40 carat green diamond. Sought after, in quick succession, by the FBI, an energy mogul who brings new meaning to the word evil, and an urbane East Bay gangster, all of whom believe that he has the diamond, Noah discovers that he is also the focus of intense—and at times deadly—interest by various and sundry denizens of a previously unsuspected spirit world. An amorous faerie, a beautiful but murderous Ukrainian vampire, the demonic leader of the 18th century Haitian slave rebellion, and a scarily powerful dark entity named Mildred are but a few of the characters Noah encounters in his efforts to not only find the missing violin, but also, and most importantly, stay alive.

Review
I found this fantasy variant of the hardboiled detective novel at times amusing and always entertaining but containing unfortunate flaws in construction that rendered the final product somewhat less than compelling. Miller’s impeccable prose and complete familiarity with the detective genre carried this novel. Were it not for the frequent use of well-worn conventions and its over-reliance on some of the more superficial aspects of the fantasy genre, this story may have garnered a higher score. As it is, I feel this light and humorous tale of unexpected discoveries in a world of demons and spirits may find quite a receptive audience among devotees of the two genres represented in the novel.

Story Quality
The story did not really get off the ground until about 10,000 words in. However, I found the quality of the writing not only good but exceptionally good, and I enjoyed the frequent use of gentle humour and references to well-known detective story authors along the way toward the real statement of the novel’s objective.

Noah Morgan, the main character, was well drawn and in many ways sympathetic, even to someone such as me, who is not conversant in the detective genre. Miller gave Noah true multi-dimensional depth, but I feel he did not go quite far enough in making the character believable or human. Noah was an interesting, quirky character, but in his relation to the plot he was perhaps most akin to James Bond. He bedded the various spirit vixens when it suited him, even when wise counsel advised against such dalliances.

But it was the Teflon-coated Superman quality about him that most reduced the power of the character, and the significance of the novel. Noah was forever receiving free and often unsolicited advice and services from well-intentioned ordinary bad guys, experts, underworld kingpins, and spirit-world baddies. In one scene, for instance, he brings a hundred dollar bill to a meeting with a crime world information broker. Noah asks a question and passes the bill to the baddie, who pushes the bill right back toward Noah. This goes on for the better part of two pages, with Noah finally pocketing the bill. He receives similar refusals of payment from a violin expert, a cab driver, and various other helpers throughout the novel. Miller laudably treats these scenes as opportunities for mild humour, but I felt these occasions of easy plot development were made at the expense of plausibility and greatly reduced my interest in the story.

I felt the most glaring instances of the Teflon Superman occurred in Noah’s interactions with several types of demons and ghouls. In many dire situations, he could simply hold up his hands, and without explanation he was able to kill or incapacitate his opponent. Explanations were never provided, but more importantly, exercising these inexplicable abilities never caused any difficulties for Noah. This easy invocation of exception, supernatural powers—without cost to the hero—is one of the sure signs of an author unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the fantasy genre. Great power must carry great cost. Best of all are those fantasy novels that expect not only cost but great risk associated with the exercise of unusual powers. I found The Power of Stones to be entirely unstudied in its use of fantasy convention, and therefore more than a little disappointing in its execution.

While Miller made frequent use of humour and offered multiple and perfectly-placed references to well-known detective literature, I never felt that he was attempting parody or humour as the primary objective of his novel. Rather, the novel appears to be a bona fide attempt to integrate detective novel conventions into the greater context of a fantasy story. The story was genuinely entertaining, but I do not feel it met the standards I would associate with a great novel.

Writing Quality
Miller has a merry facility with every aspect of written English, converting fascinating ideas into witty prose and delightful narrative. From the standpoint of writing ability, I consider Miller to be second to none, and I find myself more than a little interested in sampling some of his earlier, non-fantasy works. After several months of rejecting candidate novels due to language incompetence, The Power of Stones provided me a daily infusion of cheery optimism for the future of indie novels. Rare as they may be, there are some real gems out there in the indie world, and Miller’s engaging prose proves authors of merit, ability, and significance are to be found among the dregs and dross of independent publishing.

Overall
This is a fine story for anyone who enjoys detective novels. True fans of the fantasy genre may find this novel overly simplistic and somewhat disappointing, but gentle humour, exceptional prose, and fascinating situations may more than make up for striking deficits in other areas.

Three and a half stars

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Best of Sift Giveaway Winners

2011-12-24T01:05:00.001-05:00

We want to thank everyone for participating in our Best of Sift Celebration! Many thanks to the authors interviewed, the blog readers and those who shared the links via Twitter & Facebook!

The winner of Tag by Simon Royle is...

D Winger!

The winner of Hexult by Perry Aylen is...

Aria Cian!

The winner of Towards Yesterday by Paul Jones is...

Christina Marie!

The winner of Angelfall by Susan Ee is...

Roger Caprino!

Winners, your author will be contacting you shortly. Thanks to everyone who read the interviews and entered the giveaways!

And Happy Holidays from Sift Book Reviews! May you give and get many great books this year!

The First Sacrifice by Peter Sahui

2011-12-23T08:16:00.000-05:00

Summary: Artorius of Cairbrunn hates being dead.

In life, he was a hero, protector to emperors and scourge of the barbarians, before he was betrayed and killed. Now, hundreds of years later, he's been summoned back to the world of mortals -- and telling hero from villain is not as simple as he once thought.

A heroic fantasy short story about right and wrong; fallen kingdoms and rising upstarts; love, loss, and the lengths to which we'll go for those we care about.

The First Sacrifice is a wonderfully written short story brimming with enough conspiracy and action to easily fill a full length fantasy novel. 4 stars out of 5

Overall, it is a solid story with good writing and a compelling fantasy plot. It has an exiled King, enchanted weapons, spirits, murder, revenge, and a great voice. My only real problem with the story is that it lacks an adequate build up of suspense—and given the dire events taking place, this problem could be easily remedied with some extra plot/character development and foreshadowing. The elements of suspense are there, I simply felt that I didn’t know the characters well enough to be invested in what side won or lost. I realize this is a difficult feat to accomplish given the shortness of the piece, however a greater sense of immediacy would turn this good story into a great story.

The First Sacrifice has a solid, intriguing ending worthy of a fantasy book. The writing shows great Fantasy potential and I would be excited to read more from this author, especially a full length novel.

Smashwords ($0.99)

My Troubles With Time by Benson Grayson

2011-12-23T08:09:00.000-05:00

Summary: An inept physics professor in his mid-thirties, still a virgin, travels back to December 1941. He plans to become a national hero by destroying the Japanese fleet which bombed Pearl Harbor. Overcoming vast difficulties he succeeds, only to be sentenced to death by a U.S. Navy Courtmartial for mistakenly sinking the Japanese vessels prior to their attack. His claims to have invented a time machine are ridiculed. However, thanks to the vagaries of time travel, he escapes and returns to the present, no longer a virgin and greatly improved.

My Troubles With Time was a problematic read for me. While it did touch on some very cool and novel ideas, the aspects that made this story unique were underutilized (e.g., time travel) while other aspects (e.g., Maynard’s self-deprecating personality) received too much attention. I didn’t feel like Maynard was passionate about time travel; what could have been the most exciting part of the story was overshadowed by his pathetic/depressing character. 3 stars out of 5.

The opening of the story was very slow and lacked relatability and conflict. It started with a self-depreciating depiction of Maynard and a description of each of his colleagues. It would have been better if these people were described to me as they occurred in the plot instead of a mass onslaught of detail about characters I hadn't met yet and therefore cared very little about. It created a very unnatural and forced atmosphere.

The beginning also desperately needed some form of conflict. The beginning mostly consisted of Maynard throwing himself a pity party and recounting all his shortcomings in life. I may have found this interesting if I was already invested in his life or him as a character, but from the get go his over exaggerated patheticness and lack of personality were exploited and caused him to become annoying fast. I understand that Maynard was supposed to present as an underdog character—even his cat hates him—but it’s overdone and disrupts plot flow and the establishment of a clear voice for Maynard.

I did enjoy the aspect of time travel in the book. There is no explanation or science behind it, it is a fact the reader is expected to readily accept and the author does a good job of making time travel believable to the reader. I liked how the time travel was interspersed with mundane events from everyday life—it made Maynard personable and started to show more of his personality.

While all in all the premise of the book is a fun idea, the overall story needs work to speed up the plot and conflict. The final conflict with the Japanese navy was great, but it needs more small conflicts leading up to this and foreshadowing the big event to come.

Also, I think the first use of the time machine would benefit from a bigger build up. Why did he make it? How did he make it? One second he’s telling the story of his mother abandoning him and in the next sentence he’s travelling back in time; this could have been a much needed jolt of plot/excitement at the beginning of the book.

A little drama occurs when he ends up in 1870 Paris during the Franco Prussion war, but it lacks suspense and the will he live or will he die that the plot so desperately needed at this point. When he is made to appear insane and loses his career, I feel pity for him, but I feel the suicide attempt is a bit too much—and yet another thing he can’t do. The fact that he’s so ridiculously pathetic has been drilled home too much by this point.

On a side note, Maynard’s fantasy (which doesn’t affect the plot at all) of going back to Pearl Harbour shouldn’t be nearly a chapter in length. It slows down the already slow plot.

The twist at the end was definitely unexpected, and from my point of view, a little too weird. Even if I was to buy into the events, the lack of emotion made it feel especially unnatural. For that type of momentous reveal, emotions should have been running a lot higher.

Overall, My Troubles With Time would benefit from some fine tuning, especially stylistically and to add suspense/conflict to the plot. It’s very much a straightforward telling of events, and would benefit from a stronger voice than Maynard’s current one. The time travel aspect, and the well known history of Pearl Harbor, add to the piece, however much refinement is needed.

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Black Scars by Steven Montano

2011-12-22T20:30:00.007-05:00

Synopsis: Something ancient has awoken. Primordial and wholly evil, a living shadow emerges from a prison made weak by the magical cataclysm called The Black. Now the Sleeper stalks the land in search of its old enemies, leaving a trail of madness and destruction in its wake.

Eric Cross, a Southern Claw warlock, has been sent to find the Woman in the Ice, the only known means to stopping this evil. Aided by a grizzled ranger and a band of wardens and inmates from a sadistic prison, Cross’ mission will bring him into conflict with an array of foes: the barbaric Gorgoloth, vampire shock troops out of the Ebon Cities, and a cadre of mercenary nihilists called the Black Circle.

Black Scars is the second novel in the series begun by Blood Skies, set on a near-future Earth after a devastating cataclysm leaves humans a minority race fighting magicians, vampires and other forms of undead.

After the events of the first novel Cross has shown abilities beyond normal human mages and is no longer an officer in the Southern Claw military. Now he conducts special missions for them, in this case searching for the one power that can defeat the Sleeper before it spreads havoc among humans and vampires alike. Whereas the first novel was largely set in human towns and the wilderness between them, Black Scars spends a significant amount of time inside one of the vampires' Ebon Cities and shows more of their violent culture and the way they treat any humans they capture.

Whereas I felt that Blood Skies started slowly, this time the story sets up the main conflict straight away and Cross is soon on the Sleeper's trail. There's plenty of action along the way with battles against hordes of undead and gladiatorial fights where the lives of Cross' comrades are the prize, but they seemed more of a threat than the Sleeper itself. The Sleeper appears intermittently through the story and because it wasn't an omnipresent threat it didn't seem as important to me as it was to the characters and I never really believed that Cross could fail. Toward the end of the story I found myself looking at the decreasing number of pages remaining and wondering when the Sleeper would return for a final fight.

Ultimately, despite the imaginative world and some entertaining set pieces, the plot felt a little unfocused for my taste. While that allowed the novel to explore more of the world than it might have done if it had concentrated on the conflict with the Sleeper, I would rather have seen that be the focus. As with Blood Skies, I felt that Black Scars is on the verge of being great but didn't quite get there.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

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Exaltations by Richard Garfinkle

2011-12-21T21:17:00.000-05:00

Summary from Goodreads: Peter Refton is a hunter of human lives. Across a score and more of Earths he has caught and captured the most fascinating and pivotal people. The knight who reformed Charlemagne's army. The bureaucrat who oversaw China's expansion and control. The inspirerer of wisdom in a million seekers of understanding. Peter Refton is that most dangerous of hunters: the biographer. He has made trophy-stories of so many, and boldly carries their lives around from world to world. Then one day, a story comes to hunt his life. Now, caught between worlds and aided by a knight, an ancestress, a sorceress and twin warriors, Peter Refton is on a Quest to -- To free himself from the coils of the most voracious of stories: the Quest. To fight the Quest itself and those who told the story onto him.

Let me first say there are many things I loved about Exaltations. It had some of the quirkiest and neatest ideas I’ve read in a long time, however the execution of the narrative fell short. 3 stars out of 5.

Exaltations’ main character, Peter Refton, has lived at least 13 times, most commonly as a reporter/biographer. The biographer and writer side to Peter was very entertaining and comprised my favorite parts of the book. The author devoted numerous details and explanations to his past lives (e.g., how his author bio would disappear until he re-entered the world) and made Peter a believable, charming character. The parts of Exaltations that contained Peter, I would give a higher rating to; I was fascinated by his life, and his introduction at the beginning of the book in war torn Afghanistan really invited the reader along for his journey.

I also particularly enjoyed the religious and mythological undertones and history of the book (e.g., the Saints); it added an old world authenticity. The whole concept of reincarnation and remembering past lives was fascinating (and at times heartbreaking).

My main concern with Exaltations is plot development. The reader is introduced to a myriad of characters shortly after meeting Peter, causing the story to feel disjointed and jilted. As a reader, I was interested in Peter’s story but didn’t know his universe well enough for the story to suddenly become so tangential. I think it would have been helpful if the other characters, and moments of philosophical abstraction, had been interspersed more throughout. The writing is meant to be experimental, but perhaps making the reader more invested in the tangible story before turning the writing more metaphysical would have aided plot development.

The novel is well written, however in some areas the author appeared to take poetic licensing with sentence and paragraph structure—sometimes it worked artistically, other times it distracted me from the work.

Also, it was interesting to have Time and Quest (and others) personified as characters, however it needed to be interspersed with more traditional characters to give the reader an anchor and to build suspense/conflict. Parts of Exaltations were cyclical and a little too convoluted; large chunks of abstraction are difficult to become invested in as a reader.

Exaltations is definitely more of a philosophical/thinker read than any of the other books I’ve read for Sift. Overall the experimental narrative was fun to read and the author focuses on many philosophical ideals. I would be interested to read a more traditional fantasy novel by this author; the writing was solid and the ideas interesting, but the plot was too convoluted for me to become fully invested.

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Shiewo: A Fantasy Flight to Adventure by Ciye Cho

2011-12-21T10:00:00.001-05:00

Summary: The universe of Orberana is a place of great wonder and peril, a dizzying landscape filled with clouds that can talk, clockwork beings that mark their own time, and painted animals that awake in the night.

Shiewo Morose is the captain of a flying ship powered by music. She is also a determined young woman on a mission: a quest to find the Wishing Fish that created Orberana.

Sailing above the clouds, Shiewo and her crew (Erduu the bamboo, Theo the cloud, Livingston the goldfish, and Felix the painter) are headed for worlds of crazed clockwork bureaucrats, tyrannic kings, and tornado children--worlds that will test not only the crew's bravery... but their very understanding of adventure.

Theirs is the odyssey of a lifetime...

Shiewo takes place in the universe of Oberana: a place where pianos fly and a Fish created the Universe—and that’s just the beginning of it. The novel has a very Terry Pratchett Discworld feel to it; it’s quirky, original, and the crafting of the world is detailed and well done. However, the book suffers from a lack of conflict and suspense; it needs a more concrete plot and clear subplots to draw the reader in. 3 stars out of 5.

The beginning outlined the books purpose—Captain Shiewo was going to seek out the Wishing Fish. Due to the fantastical nature of the world, the non-humanness of the characters, and all of the unknowns surrounding the Wishing Fish, it was difficult to become invested in the Fish as the main storyline. I was left guessing about too many details for too long and it alienated me from the story. I needed more feelings and motivations behind what was happening: why was it so important to see the Wishing Fish? What dire consequences were there if they didn’t? As a reader, there were too many unknowns thrown out all at once and it prevented any suspense build up; the strangeness of how the Universe works was explained at a detriment to the plot. I really needed to know more about the characters’ personalities and the history behind why they acted the way they did.

The process of them gearing up the Odyssey (their ship) and their initial flight also went on for too long. The idea of a Shiewo’s piano playing controlling the ship was entertaining, but again it was lacking conflict; it didn’t feel like the plot was moving forward.

Perhaps the biggest problem with this book is that the ending is really a segue for a sequel. The book cannot stand alone; the ending caused the sparse elements of conflict that existed in the novel to be feel unsatisfying and unresolved.

Overall, Shiewo reveals a cleverly imagined world brimming with neat and unique ideas. With some work on plot flow, suspense, and establishing a more tangible conflict, the author could have a whimsical masterpiece on her hands.

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