Posted by Gah! I’ve been having so much fun with Indie authors!
This was a short and fast paced book with an even faster more action filled ending that left me going “damnit, what happens now?!”
I’m looking forward to the sequel
This book is multi POV, and what I liked was that we are introduced to the next POV before we get their POV so I’m not left thinking “who is this and why should I care?”. I do that sometimes with a bunch of POV’s being introduced in the beginning.
What I liked even more is we see both sides of the story, the good guys and the bad guys both get POV’s and that’s something I always enjoy in a book.
The book is almost reminiscent of an alternative Earth, the names are normal and easy to follow, so for those of you who upvoted that comment that wack ass fantasy names get to be too much at points, this book has names like John, George, Victor, Lucian etc. Nothing hard to pronouce or hard to remember/follow.
Yay a map! I love maps.
So, in this book there are multiple religions fighting for power, and it’s a central theme to the book. Both sides are looking for stones that have certain powers attributed to them. The stone of Healing, Communication, Invisibility, Levitation, Elemental Control etc.
There’s a book in the story called The Path of Man, and in it lie secrets to what’s known as The Garden of Stones, where supposedly there’s a wealth of these powerful stones that grant the user magical abilities.
The Path of Man is a book valuable enough for people to kill, and die for, and the main character Arkin is trying to learn what he can from it before it’s too late.
Soul Tapping is another form of magic, and it enhances the senses and a persons strength, only a handful of people left in the world are able to Soul Tap and with stones they become even more powerful.
I’m pretty impressed this was a debut novel, pacing was tight, dialogue was natural, a good amount of action in it, and reveals at the right times. Several reveals took me by surprise, and I always like that.
The characters were done well, and I always enjoy seeing an evil person humanized – I like villian POV’s for that reason. When all I see is one perspective I’m always left wondering why the villians are doing what they are doing. We’re told that from the good guys POV, but I like hearing it for myself from their POV.
This book is pretty short, so if you’re looking for a book you can sit down and read in one go, or a break from Malazan/Stormlight Archive kinds of books, you can pick this one up and get a reprieve from the giant door stopping tomes.
The prose is straightforward, kind of like Sanderson, so that added to how quickly I was able to read it.
I enjoyed myself a lot, if you like sword fights, multi pov, villian pov, and shorter books that help with attention span issues I recommend picking this one up!
Free on Kindle Unlimited. Or 2.99 for non members Low risk investment.
Also a newer member on r/fantasyu/mattmoss
This review is not in the current SPFBO style, I may come back and fix it later.
Plot: 8/10
Characters 7.5/10
World Building: 8/10
Pacing: 9/10
Writing: 8/10
Originality: 7/10
Total Final Score: 47.5/60 or 7.9/10 or 4 stars on goodreads.
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