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Jump to navigationJump to searchStealing Into Winter: being the first adventure from the chronicles of Jeniche of Antar by Graeme K Talboys (view source)
Revision as of 16:05, 20 August 2020
, 16:05, 20 August 2020no edit summary
This seems very much a book of two halves, or two-thirds and one-third to be precise. The first part of the novel feels as if it was written by a totally different person to the last third. Perhaps it was first-book-in-a-series syndrome and once the introductions were out the way, the author relaxed more into it, but the first 60% seems almost as if he's so busy creating the literary flow (and the language is often very beautiful) that he sometimes loses the feeling of pace.
It's a world where things certainly happen. From the beginning we're thrown straight into the mayhem of a city escaping an advancing army , however, although we can read excitement into it, we can't always feel it. Also , the style is a little choppy in places with characters disappearing from view as if forgotten. (A few times I flicked back and forth to check if I'd missed something.) Once we get to the final third though, it bristles with a pace and menace that would have lifted the story into a category of excellence if it had been there from the beginning.
The characters also take a while to warm up as the urchin-like Jeniche seems to be the only one fleshed out for most of the novel. However, eventually others like the hulking, simple but kindly Trag and mysterious swordsman Alltud blossom beyond their stereotypes and, again, just over half way in the magic starts. Graeme K Talboys starts to display a gift for witty dialogue, transforming Alltud, for instance, into a man of substance with a pronounced sense of humour and irony. The Dalai-Lamaesque God-King, Gyan Mi also develops a more substantial form in the imagination the nearer he gets to home and will certainly be someone to watch out for in the next volume.
A special thank you to Roundfire for sending us a copy of this book for review.
If you've enjoyed this and are a lover of ripping fantasy adventure, we thoroughly recommend [[Theft of Swords by Michael J Sullivan]]. However, if you prefer fantasy mixed with mellifluous language, then off to the classic [[The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien]]. You might appreciate [[Walter and The Resurrection of G: A mysterious & dramatic novel in which the medieval world confronts our own by T J Armstrong]].
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