By February I had heard enough people mention how eagerly they were awaiting the sequel to your first novel, 2007's The Name of the Wind, that I was intrigued and decided to pick up the first book in the series.

The Name of the Wind begins this way: "It was night again. The Waystone Inn lay in silence, and it was a silence of three parts." The following paragraphs go on to describe all three parts of the silence. The first is "a hollow, echoing quiet," the second the silence of two customers at the bar who "drank with quiet determination, avoiding serious discussions of troubling news." But it's the third silence that is most unsettling, the silence of a red-haired man polishing the bar. It was, the third person omniscient narrator tells us, "the patient, cut-flower sound of a man who is waiting to die. "

The red-haired man is an innkeeper who goes by the name of Kote, but he is also more than an innkeeper, and more than Kote. When a terrifying, spider-like being nearly kills one of the inn's few customers, Kote is the only one who knows what to watch out for and what to do.

Later, a man referred to as Chronicler comes to the inn, and Kote admits to Chronicler that he is Kvothe (pronounced like the word "quothe"), a famous, heroic figure now in hiding. But Kvothe doesn't see himself as others see him, and only agrees to tell Chronicler his story if Chronicler will stay at the Waystone for three days and record Kvothe's tale word for word, without altering anything.

Kvothe's story, told to Chronicler in first person, begins when Kvothe is eleven. Kvothe is one of the Edema Ruh, a highly-regarded troupe of actors and other performers. From his father Kvothe begins to soak up acting and music. From his mother, a noblewoman who left her family to be with his father, Kvothe learns etiquette.

One day the troupe takes in Abenthy, an arcanist (magic user) who helps them with lighting and special effects. Abenthy, or Ben as Kvothe calls him, was educated at the University and teaches Kvothe much of what he knows, including Sympathy, a system of magic that helps Kvothe redirect energy from one object to another. But what Kvothe most wants to learn is how Ben did something Kvothe once saw him do — call the wind so that the wind came and did Ben's bidding.

Ben refuses to teach Kvothe the name of the wind, but he does tell Kvothe's parents that Kvothe is a child prodigy, able to absorb nearly any skill with almost no mistakes. He will be the best at whatever he chooses to be, Ben informs them, so they should think carefully about what opportunities to give their son. Kvothe overhears this conversation and dreams of attending the University, but at age eleven, he does not know what lies ahead of him.

The troupe parts from Ben around the time Kvothe turns twelve, and on that occasion, Kvothe's father performs the first verse of a song he is working on. It is a song about the Chandrian, a group of legendary demons. Kvothe's father is collecting legends about them because he wants to write the definitive song, the one that hearkens back to the root of these legends.

The Chandrian are believed to be nothing more than a superstition, but one night Kvothe returns from gathering firewood to find his entire troupe dead, and the surrounding fires burning blue, a sign of the mythical Chandrian's presence. And indeed, the Chandrian are in front of him for a few moments, before they disappear.

Kvothe is left grieving and utterly alone in the world at age twelve. He forages in the forest and teaches himself to play his father's lute even better. A fateful trip to the nearby city of Tarbean in order to replace a lute string turns Kvothe into an urchin. He lives on Tarbean's streets for three years, until something reopens the memories he has shut away. Memories of his parents and of the Chandrian, of his dreams of attending the University and acquiring knowledge.

Eventually fifteen year old Kvothe arrives at the University and it is here that he makes dear friends and dangerous enemies, here that he learns greater magic, and here that he falls in love. He also cannot let go of his need to get to the bottom of the truth about the beings who killed his parents, even though it places him at great risk.

I enjoyed The Name of the Wind a great deal. One of the things I really appreciated was the device of having Kvothe's tale told by his older self, and the occasional interludes which allow us to see Kvothe in a different place in his life, and to sense danger lurking around the Waystone Inn.

This story-within-a-story structure, known in literary terms as a frame device, gave the book extra richness due to the age gap between the teenage Kvothe and the more mature and weary Kvothe who was telling the story. We got both the younger Kvothe's viewpoint and the perspective of his older, wiser self, who knows things the teenage Kvothe does not.

Alternated with these viewpoints is the third person narration of the frame story, so even though the book is mostly written in first person, there is more variety of voice, perspective and texture than in many first person books.

Still, and although we meet his family, his friends and the woman he loved, there is no question that the focus of the novel is Kvothe himself, and one of the things that kept me reading was the desire to see how he had evolved from the boy he had been to the man telling the story of his youth. Another was Kvothe's voice – witty, opinionated, and as a boy, often unwise.

I think that Kvothe could fairly be described as a Marty Stu (male equivalent of a Mary Sue) character because he is not only a child prodigy, but by age fifteen he is endowed with so many gifts – near perfect recall, a quick and strategic mind, lively curiosity, a talent for verbal sparring, a gorgeous voice and a breathtaking musicianship with the lute, to say nothing of his command of magic.

Normally so many talents in one character would be a sure way to turn me off, so Kvothe's saving grace is his propensity to making big mistakes. He takes chances that most people would not, and while some of them pay off, others land him in trouble. It is this quality, along with his witty opinions, and his vulnerability, that make the younger Kvothe so engaging and make it possible to believe in his genius.

There when many times during the reading of this book that I found myself thinking, "No Kvothe, no! Don't do it!" And he went ahead and did whatever impulsive, courageous yet unwise thing it was I wished he wouldn't do. I see my desire to spare Kvothe from pain and punishments as a sign of my huge investment in this character and his fate. His failings made him real and endearing to me.

One of other endearing things about Kvothe is that he judges people based on their behavior rather than their social status, and doesn't see himself as particularly better than anyone else. He is willing to do some shady things on occasion, but there are other moral lines which he would never in a million years cross. There is a great exchange between Kvothe and Ambrose, the university student who later becomes his nemesis.

Kvothe walks into the University's Archives to see Ambrose and a female student, Fela, at the front desk. Ambrose is sexually harassing Fela, but his family is so powerful that she can't protest, and Kvothe cannot bear to stand by and do nothing. He sees Ambrose's attempt at a poem on the desk, and sets about rescuing Fela by eviscerating Ambrose's writing.

Ambrose looked over his shoulder, scowling. "You have damnable timing, E'lir. Come back later." He turned away again, dismissing me.

I snorted and leaned over the desk, craning my neck to look at the sheet of paper he'd left lying there. "I have damnable timing? Please, you have thirteen syllables in a line here." I tapped a finger onto the page. "It's not iambic either. I don't know if it's anything metrical at all."

He turned to look at me again, his expression irritated. "Mind your tongue, E'lir. The day I come to you for help with poetry is the day–"

"- is the day you have two hours to spare," I said. "Two long hours, and that's just for getting started. "So same can the humble thrush well know its north?' I mean, I don't even know how to begin to criticize that. It practically mocks itself."

"What do you know of poetry?" Ambrose said without bothering to turn around.

"I know a limping verse when I hear it," I said. "But this isn't even limping. A limp has rhythm. This is more like someone falling down a set of stairs. Uneven stairs. With a midden at the bottom."

"It is a sprung rhythm," he said, his voice stiff and offended. "I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"Sprung?" I burst out with an incredulous laugh. "I understand that if I saw a horse with a leg this badly "sprung,' I'd kill it out of mercy, then burn its poor corpse for fear the local dogs might gnaw on it and die."

How can you not love a character like Kvothe? I couldn't help loving him. A lot of the charm of this book is Kvothe's charm, his indelible appeal, as well as the human scale of his personal story. If he isn't the hero others think he is, he is still more heroic than he gives himself credit for.

The Name of the Wind clocks in at 726 Kindle pages, or 13,459 locations. That is one long book, a huge investment of time, especially when you consider that it is only the first of the three parts of Kvothe's story. The early parts of the book, especially the beginning at the Waystone Inn and then the time Kvothe spends on the streets of Tarbean, dragged a little for me. But the vast majority of the book was greatly involving and entertaining, and there was an artistry to the narration and the dialogue that makes this book stand out among many others.

Even though I'm not usually one to embark on such long tomes, much less series that follow the same protagonists, I find myself anticipating book two. As for The Name of the Wind, it is a terrific novel and one I can easily see myself rereading. A-/A.

Sincerely,

Janine

Book Link | Kindle | Amazon | nook | BN | Borders
| Sony| KoboBooks

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This is a tough book to review because it is the fifth book in an epic romance fantasy story and this story brings to conclusion plot arcs that began in book 1.   For that reason, the measure by which I have judged this book is how satisfying I found it to be as a reader and fan of the series.   How helpful this is to others, I have no clue.   Further, I don’t think that there is anyway that I can write a review or anything about this book without spoiling it for those who haven’t read the series.

I will say from the outset that I don’t think this is a good place for new readers to start and the idea of beginning a five book series has to be daunting for new readers. I know that I have shied away from plunging into a highly recommended series because of length.   However, if there are new readers out there who are looking for a good fantasy romance read, I do think that this is a good series to pick up.   Fortunately Avon has re-released in paper and in digital, the entire series in anticipation of this fifth book conclusion.    And if you are picking up the series for the first time, you are lucky you don’t have to wait for the next book to come out.   (I’m saving up all the Moning books because I’ve heard that the wait between books is agonizing).   With those prefatory remarks, let’s get into the book.

Ellysetta and Rain are leaders of a Fey culture that is faced with external threats and internal disease. They are on the brink of war against the Eld, followers of Seledorn, who seek to destroy the Fey and overtake the humans and impose an evil and cruel rule over the world. Internally, the Tairens, creatures that are magically tied to the health and well being of the Fey are dying and are unable to procreate.   If the Tairen die, so do the Fey.

The threats, however, may be intertwined but the most incipient threat is that of war. The Eld are creating Tairen destroying weapons and human destroying creatures.   The Eld have spent decades infiltrating the human world at the highest levels and now will be triggering these Mage entranced humans into engaging in war against their friends and neighbors.

There is a more personal danger to Ellysetta and Rain.   Ellysetta has a tie to the High Mage of Eld.   Everytime she works deep magic, she exposes herself to him, exposes herself to be overtaken by the God of Shadows and become filled with evil. I didn’t find this to be a character arc because magic is the answer to this struggle rather than a personal determination to not give in to the evil.

Probably the biggest criticism of this series and of this book is the derivative nature of it. There are some components of the story that tracked closely with Tolkien’s series: the Eld, the creation of a mass Eld army out of earth, the inclusion of Elves, what roles the Elves play in the fight against the Eld.

There are quite a few battles in this book and I lost track of everyone but that is probably more a flaw of mine than a criticism of the writing but there is a good balance between the battles and the character interaction. There is a huge cast of characters and I could not remember some characters from one section of the story to another.

This is a satisfying conclusion to the end of the saga. Every loose end seemed to be tied up and there is a satisfying conclusion for what started in book 1. While the roots of the story are firmly planted in the romance genre, this entry is more about plot than character development.   The romance you see here is strengthened between the main protagonists: Ellysetta and Rain and there are poignant stories about love lost and love regained which fill in the gaps, perhaps, that exist because Ellysetta and Rain’s romance primarily takes place in books one and two.   But while I thought the story focused a great deal on the conclusion of plot arcs, there is a lot of emotion here based on the character interactions and it is full of romantic passages:

When a Fey warrior meets the woman who completes him, his soul's truemate, he knows in an instant. And in that instant, whether she will have him or no, he binds himself to her, heart and soul with the words "Ver reisa ku'chae. Kem surah, shei'tani."  which means "Your soul calls out. Mine answers, beloved." And he spends the days of their courtship-’the rest of his life, if necessary-’proving himself worthy of the magnificent gift of her love.

I admit that   would have been happy if I had just had an ending to the last book – Shan and Elfeya freed. Evil defeated. HEA for all.   One area of complaint that I would have is that   I would have liked to spend a little more time with Shan and Elfeya, two of the elder Fey characters, given how much they were tortured and struggled. Maybe there just wasn’t space but if there was anywhere I felt cheated it was in the resolution to this couple’s story.   B

Best regards,

Jane

Book Link | Kindle | Amazon | nook | BN | Borders
| Sony| BooksonBoard | Kobo

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Kristie J. emailed me not too long ago and asked me if I had read your debut release, Broken Wing.   She was so enthusiastic about the book that even though I hadn’t yet read it, I made sure I did ASAP.   And it is a very promising first novel, reminiscent of many books in the genre I love, from Laura Kinsale’s The Shadow and The Star to Laura London’s The Windflower, even to Christine Monson’s Rangoon, but also compelling in its own vision.   While I was not as blown away by Kristie by Broken Wing, I did enjoy it quite a bit, can certainly recommend it, and most definitely look forward to your next book.

Gabriel St. Croix has been raised – if that is the proper term – in a Paris brothel, a child abandoned to the darkest desires of human nature and grown into a man almost resigned to serving them for the rest of his days, however many there may be.   Numbing himself through alcohol, relieving his despair through self-cutting, Gabriel has two jobs:   playing the roles demanded by the wealthy men and women who purchase him and protecting young Jamie’s innocence as long as possible.   Although the boy is sibling to one of England’s peers and heir to a peerage himself, he has mysteriously ended up at Madame Etienne’s and would certainly face a life like Gabriel’s if not for the young man’s surprising protection.

When Sarah Munroe and her half-brother Ross, the Earl of Huntington, finally locate their brother at the brothel, they are shocked that he has not been harmed or debased and are more than a little grateful to Jamie’s stalwart friend, honoring Jamie’s insistence that he will not leave the brothel without Gabriel.   Reluctantly but resignedly, Ross strikes a deal with Gabriel, securing his agreement to help James for a year to transition back to life as an English peer in exchange for ten thousand pounds.   Gabriel has already begun to wonder if his own life will be worth protecting after Jamie leaves:

Gabriel’s breath stilled in his chest.   Miraculously, he was being offered another chance, and despite his best efforts to strangle it, hope was born again.   He knew he shouldn’t trust it.   Vile temptress, she betrayed him every time, leaving him weak and wounded in ways too cruel to endure without the familiar palliatives of brandy and blood.   He also knew, deep in his soul, if refused her now the offer would not come again.

It is no easy transition to life beyond the brothel, however, and Gabriel suffers terribly under the weight of his own past, his own conviction that he is not worth the respect and growing affection Ross and Sarah show him.   But as the months progress, as Gabriel experiences life beyond the brothel, Sarah’s unconventional manner, along with her mannish dress and startling beauty, attract Gabriel, but her blunt interest in his past, along with her habit of pushing on Gabriel’s most painful spots, makes their relationship prickly.   The young widow finds Gabriel similarly alluring, although her own experience with her husband has not left her with much desire for further romantic attachment.   That she and Gabriel grow closer and closer is not surprising considering his unacknowledged hunger for affection and acceptance and Sarah’s own experiences with loss that have made her adept at assembling a ragtag, makeshift family for herself.

What is surprising is that Sarah and Gabriel’s initial love story is only half the novel, setting the stage for the adventure story that follows, a story driven by Gabriel’s need to prove himself to Sarah and the slightly more conventional Ross, who is none too thrilled that his sister finds her soulmate in a former “catamite and a whore.”   The young man who once believed that his life was worth no more than the money people paid to degrade him grows into an accomplished privateer under the tutelage of Sarah and Ross’s “cousin,” the colorful pirate Davey, who pledges to help Gabriel earn his fortune for the fair Lady Sarah.

Plenty of dangerous escapades ensue, and eventually Gabriel ends up halfway across the world, presumed dead by his adopted English family, enslaved on the Barbary coast in circumstances that draw him back to his early years, slowly deadening almost all the signs of life his adoptive family had allowed him to hope for and realize.   How he and Sarah work themselves back to each other consumes the last part of the book, which finds Gabriel improbably but decidedly back in Paris and London, wealthy beyond his imaginings but deader perhaps than he was before his initial bargain with Ross.

If it sounds as if this novel covers a great deal of ground – thematically and geographically – then I have accurately rendered its scope.   Indeed, that is one of the book’s greatest points of interest and its Achilles Heel, as well, signaling a profound ambition of storytelling but also a need to account for months and years passing unattended by the narrator and great swaths of on page action.   While I relished the late 18th century setting, the reach from Paris to Spain to the Barbary Coast (how many Romance novels tackle this important area, despite the fact that England was involved in the Barbary Wars on and off within fifteen years after the start of the 19th century), I also got frustrated by the voice-over narration employed to cover that ground:

Two years passed, Napoleon Bonaparte had amassed a huge force in the Mediterranean port of Toulon, sending shivers throughout Europe and the Ottoman Empire.   England, Spain, Sicily, and Portugal, all potential targets, had breathed a sigh of relief when he had turned to the east, setting the French flag over the pyramids of Egypt.   Days later, the battle ships that had accompanied his transport fleet were caught at anchor by the British at Aboukir Bay, and all but two of them were lost in the Battle of the Nile.   The Egyptian debacle had given the British strategic control of the Mediterranean, and handed Napoleon his first defeat, leaving his troops stranded, cut off by sea from rescue or reinforcement.

The spring of 1802, found them in the Atlas Mountains again, fighting for their lives.   Several local chieftains, organized, armed, and led by Moroccan insurgents based in Fez, had caught them in a coordinated pincer attack, trapping them in a steep defile with no avenue of retreat.   Their captain, guilty of a gross underestimation of his enemy’s ferocity, organization, and numbers, paid for it with his life.   The vanguard had been ambushed and slaughtered, and the rear guard was struggling to join the caravan, paying dearly in blood and death each step of the way.

While some readers will likely put these passages down to “info dumping,” I did not object so much to the inclusion of the details as to the way the narrator breaks so abruptly in to the story at these points, throwing me off my reading rhythm and giving me flashbacks to Peter Falk in “The Princess Bride.”   And while I didn’t relish the idea of narrowing the scope of the novel, that awkward transitioning occurred too often to ignore, making the book feel more sprawling than grand, especially in the sections where Gabriel is trying to make his way back to Europe.   I honestly had to resist the urge to skim some of those chapters, and I don’t know for sure whether what I felt was fatigue or boredom or sheer overstimulation from everything that was happening over various clusters of chapters.   The first few chapters, especially, came across to me as so tightly and crisply written in comparison to the later sections of the book that I may have suffered from some disappointed expectations, as well.

The awkward narration contrasted with the fresher, stronger elements of the novel, especially the ways in which my jaded expectations were so often thwarted by the movement of the story.   Where I expected Gabriel to remain flinty hard he softened and became painfully vulnerable.   Where I expected Ross to transform into the evil older brother, he emerged as an honorable but protective man who cared more about his family’s emotional ties than social propriety.   When I expected Sarah to martyr herself to lost love she shows herself to be realistic and mature, determined to live her life as happily as possible.

Sarah’s passion with Gabriel is deep and believable, their growing bond faithfully following a logical character trajectory, providing dimension and authentic emotion to an age-old Romance pairing.   Much of this dimension is due to the fake-rakeness of Gabriel, and by that I do not mean that his dissolution was false, but rather that he turned out to be so much more than the whore he believed himself to be initially.   There were elements of this novel that reminded me of Laura Leone’s Fallen From Grace, especially in those places where Gabriel struggles to accept that Ross, Sarah, and Davey see a worthy human being in him, where he finds himself carried away by the strength of hope and wonder inside himself.   Those sections of the novel are among my favorites because they communicate a vast tenderness, both in the sense of pain and sensitivity:

“Hah!” she chuckled, ruffling his hair, and kissing his nose, “I always thought I could drive a man wild if I cared to try, and right now I"m inordinately proud of myself.   Oh, Gabe, I never knew!   I had no idea!   I never knew anything could feel so wonderful!”

“Neither did I,” he said honestly.
Cupping his face in her hands, she whispered against his lips, “Thank you, my love.”

“Thank you, ma chère.”   He lay, sated and at ease in a totally unfamiliar way, amazed and wonderstruck.   He had pleased his woman, and his own pleasure had been overwhelming, and for once, free of guilt.   Hugging her tight he rocked her in his arms until exhausted, warm breath intermingling, they fell asleep in a tangle of loose limbs, silken sheets, and soft words of love.

Watching Gabriel discover and be revealed to himself was so lovely.   The small things he needed to learn and their stark contrast to the things he already knew, had been trained.   He was educated and musically gifted, not as a sign of his social freedom, but rather of his imprisonment to the whim of one of his masters, a particularly twisted and sadistic man who found entertainment in Gabriel’s more refined accomplishments.   So when Gabriel begins to explore the previously uncharted territory of his own heart, there is both heartbreak and magnanimous hope for him and for the reader.   The stargazing hobby he and Sarah share becomes a perfect metaphor for the emotional exploration they undertake.   And Sarah, who sometimes seems a bit too good to be true, is at least reliably human in her own emotional vulnerabilities, even if she shows more self-possession than I would have expected of someone who had lost so many people and who had the experiences in marriage she did.   Had she been more naïve, ironically, I would likely not have been so questioning of her emotional steadiness, because I would have seen her more as Leda from The Shadow and The Star.   Instead she reminded me more of Sydney from Gaffney’s Wild at Heart, except that Gabriel did not possess Michael’s innocence.

Nonetheless, I am very glad I read Broken Wing, and I think that readers who miss that epic quality to historical Romance and who loved the melodrama of so many of those older books will take to this story.   And while I wish the writing had been tighter and the narrative more polished, there are many things that worked well for me in Broken Wing, earning it a B- from me.

~ Janet

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells. No ebook format.

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RWA is not an organization that is well suited to address the concerns of epublishing. I don’t believe that the individuals who run RWA or who are currently on the board have a clear understanding of the business of epublishing. Importantly, I want to note that RWA is not remiss in its inability to carve language that would include legimate epresses and keep those that are not. Rather I think RWA is focused on serving the authors who aspire to have print published careers. There is nothing wrong with this.

EPIC, however, is an association dedicated to epublishing. On its front page, EPIC states:

EPIC, the Electronically Published Internet Connection, is a professional organization for published and contracted e-book and print authors. It was established to provide a strong voice for electronic publishing.

Even though E-Publishing is a relatively new venue, there are many readers, writers, and traditionally published authors who believe this is one of the major marketplaces of the future. EPIC exists to help professional writers learn more about the best publishing opportunities on the Internet and to provide networking opportunities for exchange of information about promotion and market growth.

In the past year, when we have seen more than one epublisher show their ass online and more and more authors being taken advantage of, I have found myself asking where the hell is EPIC? If EPIC, an association dedicated to epublishing can’t make a stand regarding the epublishing industy, what use is it other than to pat itself on the back and give questionably meaningful industry awards.

Here is why it should be EPIC’s business to protect e authors, even those that are not members.

The continual showing of incompetency, unscrupulousness and general asshattery of epublishers shines a negative light on epublishing as a whole. If New Concepts, a standard bearer in epublishing, has totally dropped its efforts to edit, it is hardly a step away from Publish America. Let’s have a short run down of just a few examples, no?

• Whiskey Press charges authors a $90 setup fee for print books. Per the comments WP does not charge for printing books outright. Instead an author must either sell a certain number of ebooks or buy the ebooks herself to see her book in print.
• New Concepts admits that it doesn’t do any editing.
• Twilight Fantasies closes its doors after six months.
• Mardi Gras publishing goes out of business and the owner opens a new epress to peddle her own books just a few months later.

Emily Veinglory lists approximately 60 epublishers on her site but would only recommend about five of them (back in December 2007). Emily is obviously do a great service (for no compensation) but one that I think an epublishing organization like EPIC should provide. Instead, its focus is on its awards and the pay services for editing that are recommended through its site.

I find it ironic that EPIC can identify qualified individuals to help you edit your book but not help you decide where to submit it once its all polished and pretty. In fact, it seems that EPIC is more interested in peddling other pay services than actually providing a resource for authors to find out more about the epublishing business. A standard contract is of minimal help when you sign on with a company that has no business publishing books. Where is the information about what to look for in an epublisher? What questions should an author ask? What information should be expected?

Everytime there is a NCP or Mardi Gras Publishing or Triskelion or whatnot that falls on its face in a blaze of un-glory, it gives ammunition to those who believe that epublishing is nothing more than a step away from self publishing. It hurts legitimate houses and legitimate authors. It tarnishes epublishing within the eyes of editors, industry folks, and ultimately readers. Readers become reluctant to give their credit card information to a house that cannot act professionally.

I believe in the doctrine of self help and that authors who don’t do enough to protect themselves warrant little pity when taken for a ride. But sometimes unless there is information readily available, unless some organization with greater power than individual author takes a stand for those authors, self help cannot be obtained.

What is the purpose of EPIC, if not to at least protect the reputation of epublishing. Because the more that the epublishing industry’s image is tarnished, the less those EPPIEs have any relevance to readers.

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Lord of the Fading Lands first came to my attention when my blogging partner, Jane, sent all her co-bloggers an excited email after reading an ARC of the book back in the summertime. Soon afterward, Jane blogged about the book and since then, others have fallen in love with it, both here and elsewhere.

Since I often enjoy romantic fantasy and love a good epic romance, I have been wanting to read Lord of the Fading Lands for a while, and now that I have I can say that while the book was enjoyable enough that I wasn’t sorry I read it, I also won’t be reading it a second time.

Lord of the Fading Lands is the story of Rain Tairen Soul, an ancient and tormented fey who once nearly destroyed the world when he lost his mate. Now Rain’s people, the fey, are in grave danger, and Rain senses that to save them, he must find a red haired mortal woman whose image he sees in a prophetic orb called the Eye of Truth.

For the first time in a thousand years, Rain leaves the feys’ Fading Lands and journeys to the kingdom of Ceileria, where he senses the woman, Ellysetta Baristani, when she is injured while watching him in a crowd. He also senses that she is his soulmate — something that should be impossible for a Tairen Soul. Part of Rain is a tairen, a large, predatory cat capable of flight, and it is when Rain is shapeshifted into this form that he tries to come to Ellysetta’s rescue, and succeeds in frightening her and the Ceilerian spectators.

Ellie, as her family members call her, is the adopted daughter of a woodcarver and his wife. Since childhood Ellie has been plagued by strange and frightening dreams. She has terrible memories that she represses, but has also had romantic daydreams about the very same man who now claims she is his mate — Rain Tairen Soul.

Another man also wants Ellie for his wife. Den suspects Ellie of being capable of magic which he wants to harness for his own benefit. Ellie find Den repugnant and would rather marry anyone else, so even though she is afraid of the tairen in Rain and thinks that he will never love her as he did the mate he lost in a war a thousand years earlier, she prefers him to Den. But Den, of course, won’t step aside so easily.

Lord of the Fading Lands isn’t just the story of Ellie and Rain’s courtship; it also features many other characters, including Ellie’s kindhearted father; her mother, who fears any kind of magic; her two little sisters; the five fey warriors who guard Ellie at Rain’s behest; the king and queen of Ceileria; Den; a mysterious and evil man who is stalking Ellie; and Ellie’s friend whom that man is willing to use as a pawn.

If that sounds like a lot, it’s because it is. The breadth of this book’s scope and the large cast of characters are its greatest pleasures. Reading it, I realized how much I had missed reading books with multiple subplots, and between the excitement over this series and the popularity of J.R. Ward’s books, I wonder if others have also missed those big, thick books which contain a strong romance but focus on other characters as well.

I also found the world-building in this book superior; far more intricate and detailed than what I frequently see in paranormal romances. The development of that world that was one of the book’s strongest aspects. The writing style was nice as well and at first, I was really charmed by the spell that, much like your fey characters, you wove over me.

As the book progressed, however, Rain and Ellie’s courtship began to seem repetitive in that it pretty much consisted of Ellie thinking that Rain couldn’t possibly be attracted to a simple woodcarver’s daughter like herself, and being drawn to him yet afraid of the tairen inside Rain. There wasn’t much progress to the relationship, and because of the way their soul-mate connection was written, I never got to see them wonder who the other were or try to figure each other out as they got to know each other.

Another problem for me was that Ellie was so unfailingly sweet, kind and caring to everyone around her. The only time she ever got impatient and irritable was due to a supernatural event. Characters who are that good are not only a bit unrealistic, they also make me feel disappointed in myself, for being so much more flawed in comparison.

It’s not just Ellie who is good and kind. This is the kind of book where many characters have hearts of gold and almost all of the few characters who aren’t kindly, patient and good-hearted are at the opposite extreme — dastardly and villainous. For me, that made the world of this book a very comforting place to visit for the first few hours of my reading, but by the two-third point of the book, I was hungering for something with more social and psychological complexity.

Lord of the Fading Lands is also a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy in that it’s ultimately about how sweet, kind, patient but seemingly rather plain and average Ellie is one day rescued, swept away from a humdrum life by a very powerful and gorgeous man and rewarded for her sweetness, kindness and patience with the discovery that she is not plain or average after all, but possesses magical powers and the ability to win the loyalty of several powerful warriors who would consider it an honor to die for her.

There is nothing wrong with an old-fashioned Cinderella story — they can be very satisfying to read. But in this case, the wish-fulfillment aspects of the story were so pronounced that after a while, I became too conscious of them to enjoy them deeply.

Finally, I also became conscious after a while that much of the dialogue consisted of a character having something explained to them. That is, of course, how the details of the world-building were conveyed to us readers, but while it was enjoyable in its way, it also got repetitive, too, and I started wishing for dialogue where characters did not explain yet another aspect of their worlds to each other, but simply interacted and developed relationships.

I wonder if it is fair for me to make the judgments I am making about this book without having read the rest of the series, since clearly, Lord of the Fading Lands is not a finished story. It’s possible that the second or third installment of the story would show things becoming more complex than they have so far. Since I have only read the first book, that much is all that I have to go on.

Despite all that I have said, I did enjoy Lord of the Fading Lands. I loved its large canvas and though I wish the book had been more nuanced, I have to admit that its good vs. evil simplicity made for a pleasant escape from my shades-of-gray reality. While I wanted to see more progress in Rain and Ellie’s relationship, I also enjoyed the relaxing pace at which the rest of the story unfolded, the pleasing tone of the writing, and the charm of the intricate world-building.

I don’t believe I will read it again, however, nor do I feel an urge to read the sequel, which Jane recently reviewed, although it’s very possible that I will get to it eventually. I am not sorry that I read Lord of the Fading Lands, but I wish I shared Jane’s excitement and enthusiasm for this series. For me, the spell you wove was pleasant if not long-lasting, and I give the book a C+.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased in mass market. No ebook format available.

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