What do you mean that people either have to be in love, or else they are giving each other shit?

I’m not sure what you are referring to, Mayriss. I don’t think I ever said anything like that.

If you mean my reply to Martine, I just meant that I don’t need characters to be perfect, lacking all character flaws. People in real life have strengths and weaknesses, and I like characters in books to be that way too. Some characters I respect from the beginning, others I grow to respect over the course of the story, as they grow and change into better people. Both kinds are fine with me, but in this book I felt that Ellie wasn’t real enough to me because she was so perfect.

The truth is usually the heroines posses too many flaws.

I appreciate that you feel that way, but for me, heroines often come across as too perfect, or so spotless they are bland.

How can you respect a man who takes shit? But then how can you respect a woman who takes shit? You can't. So that means they need to love each otherb pretty much very quickly.

As long as I come to respect them by the end of the book, I’m okay. I don’t have to respect them from the very first page. Characters can grow and change over the course of a story into people I admire and that often makes it better for me. Just my two cents.

I actually enjoyed the characters and the world building. However, I read this one and the next back to back. Though I can see the Feehan comparison, I feel this female lead has a lot more to offer. The last 1/3 of the second book really helps the development of the female lead.

Rose, I enjoyed the worldbuilding as well, and I think Jan did too. And I didn’t dislike the characters, though I did wish for more complexity in their personalities and a flaw or two in Ellie’s.

As I said in my review, it can be difficult to judge an incomplete story. It is good to hear that Ellie’s character is developed further in the second book.

The explaining dialogue did bother me. I mean, find another way to get things across. It’s one of those things that works fine a time or too but it was a common tactic of hers. Plus you’re very right, it stood in the way of real character interaction.

Oh my the Feehan connection explains a lot. Feehan’s characters are almost all like that, and they’re life-mates, so the romances are very similar to this in their development.

It’s more or less correct that the prologue didn’t bother me as much as it did you. It was a bit difficult to understand but I didn’t let myself get too bogged down in that and just assumed my understanding of it would catch up with me later, which did turn out to be the case.

Did you also have an issue with all the explaining in the dialogue, Jan? I don’t remember you mentioning that and I haven’t seen anyone else refer to it either, so I’m wondering if it only bothered me.

I never did get around to reading part 2. You can read it first and I'll know whether or not to.

LOL. I don’t know if I’ll be reading it that soon, either. But if I do I’ll definitely let you know my thoughts.

I too liked the world-building. As for the characters, I have never read Feehan so I can’t comment on the similarity. I gather that Feehan and Wilson are critique partners. Do Feehan’s books also have characters who are either very good or very villainous?

I kept getting tripped up on “shei'tan” and “shei'tani.” In Rain's fey language these mean “beloved” (m/f) or “husband” and “wife,” but in Hindi “shaitaan” means “devil” and “shaitaani” means “wicked,” “devilish,” or “wickedness.” And it really kept tripping me up. “Say yes or no, wickedness.” “You are so beautiful, devil.” LOL!

Oh, I can’t read the sequel now! I’ll just giggle throughout the book.

You weren’t kidding Janice. We really did have a similar reaction. Except you were evidently able to handle to prologue better than I was LOL.

I never did get around to reading part 2. You can read it first and I’ll know whether or not to.

I didn’t think the world building was a problem. There are standard tropes throughout many fantasy novels. I mean, Joseph Campbell. Wilson made the world fresh and real to me. But unfortunately it was more fresh and real than the characters. I thought they were straight out of a Feehan novel.

Janine, the world building follows familiar fantasy conventions rather than being obviously drawn from any specific fantasy books. For example, the stratification of the world based on magical powers, the “cost” of overuse or misuse of magical powers, the use of dreams as the doorway for evil, the “hidden child” with special, world-saving powers, the hero who has misused his powers in the past and in that way allows evil to gain a foothold, and so on. As I said, I have no problem with that, but it didn't strike me as especially fresh, the way it struck some other readers.

I don’t have a problem with most of those either. Startification can make fantastical societies more interesting and also, realistic, since our own world is also stratitifed to some degree. The cost of overusing magic is probably necessary to putting some limitations on the characters’ abilities; otherwise they’d just be able to save or destroy the world in the blink of an eye and the book would be over before it began. Dreams as a doorway for evil is an interesting one — I have to give it some thought, since I never considered it before (but I don’t think I’ve encountered it before, either).

The “hidden child” with special powers goes back to ancient myths like the Greek ones and others. I don’t really consider it an aspect of world-building so much as an aspect of plot and characterization. The hero who has misused his powers in the past is also more of an aspect of characterization. I didn’t see Rain’s misuse of power as allowing evil to gain a foothold — it had actually wiped out a lot of evil, but the evil began to come back because he had retreated into the Fading Lands out of grief for Sariel.

And I liked the fact that Ellie was “nice,” since I'm tired of feisty, smart-mouth and kick-ass heroines, but the tendency for every male in her vicinity to fall in love with her is a pet peeve of mine.

Hmm. I am also somewhat tired of feisty, smart-mouthed and kick-ass heroines, at least when they aren’t developed beyond that type. I certainly didn’t want Ellie to be more feisty, smart-mouthed or kick-ass, but what I wanted was for her to show that she had a human flaw, so that I could recognize her as a believable human being.

I’ve yet to meet the human being who didn’t possess some kind of flaw. Now maybe Gandhi or Mother Teresa didn’t — but since I never met them, I can’t say with certainty. But usually I prefer reading about human beings to reading about saints. And in Ellie’s case, I felt that every male falling in love with her was part and parcel of her sainthood — it happened because they were able to sense the absolute goodness of her soul.

I kept getting tripped up on “shei'tan” and “shei'tani.” In Rain's fey language these mean “beloved” (m/f) or “husband” and “wife,” but in Hindi “shaitaan” means “devil” and “shaitaani” means “wicked,” “devilish,” or “wickedness.” And it really kept tripping me up. “Say yes or no, wickedness.” “You are so beautiful, devil.” LOL!

Ah, the perils of creating a language!

Oh, thank, God, I'm not the only who didn't love this book to pieces!

LOL. I was wondering what the response of readers would be to this review; if there’d be more people popping in to say that they thought it was wonderful, or others who didn’t fall in love with it.

Like you, I enjoyed the well thought out world building, but I found the characters too extreme (either too good or too evil to be realistic) and Ellie was very much a Mary Sue (for the love of God, she's so powerful she can cleanse a soul with a single touch!), but she's absolutely entrenched in denial for so long that it got really old really fast.

I agree about the characters (except for the queen) — they were extreme for my taste. Even Rain, who had this dark past, never made me doubt that he was full of virtues. In the beginning, there was something comforting about this, and I was lulled into a kind of relaxation of my usual standards for characters in books. But that effect wore off partway through, which is why I said that the spell didn’t last.

The umagi thing didn’t occur to me.

I think you liked it better than Mrs. Giggles did.

Sherry – I see what you mean! She doesn’t mince words, though the score she gave the book (69) isn’t that bad for a Mrs. Giggles review.

I understand what you mean. I did enjoy the story a lot, especially in the beginning, but towards the end the story started to lose me and once I'd finished, I didn't feel all that inclined to buy the sequel-I DID buy it (couldn't resist) but it's still sitting on my shelf. My overall impression is that I enjoyed it, but I didn't love it.

Dance – My enjoyment level was higher in the beginning also, especially since at first it reminded me just a tiny bit of Sharon Shinn’s Archangel, which I loved. But later in the book my reading slowed down, and that was when I started noticing the things I mentioned in my review. Though a lot of readers found the book difficult to put down, by the second half I noticed that I was able to stop reading in the middle pretty easily.

And I liked the fact that Ellie was “nice,” since I’m tired of feisty, smart-mouth and kick-ass heroines, but the tendency for every male in her vicinity to fall in love with her is a pet peeve of mine. I lost interest in Sookie for that reason, and I am hoping that Patricia Briggs’ Mercy doesn’t head in that direction.