David L. Dawson (1)

This started off with some action which was great, but then it slowed down and took a while to really get going again. The romance with Brian got on my nerves, it went from seeing him different, to being full on in love despite Brian not feeling the same way, the only glimpses we get of Brian make him seem not very nice and I cannot see what Ben sees in him. Skye was an interesting character and I would like to see more of her in the next book. I enjoyed the whole aspect of the Gods warring and ruining the world at the same time, but think this may be one to stay away from if you are quite religious, as it is rather anti-religion. Ben often sounded younger than his 14 years, which seemed a bit odd as he was supposed to be man and marry after that age.
The felum really interested me and I would love to hear more about them.
Overall I enjoyed the second half, but not so much the first half.

My full review, plus others, can be found here.… (mere)

The Book of Fire is the first book in a series featuring Cressida Widdershins who is a young girl living on an alternative version of our Earth. In her world the continents never split and most of the population has magic powers. Cressida is one of the few who has no powers at all, and she just happens to acquire a magic book which an evil cult wants to use to begin an ice age which will wipe out most of the life on Earth. Together with her friends, she has to find a way to stop this from happening.

Now I did quite enjoy this story. It was a pretty good concept, the world was pretty original and I liked the fact that Cressida was one of a very tiny percentage of the population who didn't have magical powers. There was a good sense of humour in the story as well, at times it reminded me of Terry Pratchett, which is always a good thing.

I think that it would probably appeal to a younger audience, possibly those who aren't quite ready for Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket. At times I found myself drawing parallels between those stories as well. However, I did find myself wondering at times whether the author was truly aware of the audience he was writing for. Occasionally there were instances of terms or language being used which I think would either be unfamiliar to a younger reader, or perhaps inappropriate for them. There were also times when one of the eleven-year-old characters would say something that didn't sound like the sort of thing an eleven-year-old would say, though I was willing to overlook those considering it was taking place in a different world to our own.

There were also some instances of irritating formatting. It was mostly simple little things but which all combined together became a bit wearing and definitely pulled me out of the story; line breaks in the middle of characters' speech, no indents at the beginning of paragraphs (making it feel more like a web text rather than a book), etc. Two of the most annoying things was the character Miss Weber alternating between being named as Miss Webber and Miss Weber (sometimes several times on the one page) for most of the first 20% of the book. It's the sort of thing that could lead me to give up on a book, but luckily it stopped after a while.

The story could have benefitted from slightly better formatting. If it had been arranged on the page with indented paragraphs then the author could have used the double line spaces to indicate where the focus was shifting. Focus shifts happened often and without warning, which could be jarring because suddenly the 'she' you were reading about was not Cressida but Miss Weber/Webber or Cressida's mother.

It took me about four or five days to read, which is longer than I'd normally spend reading a book like this. It felt long; in a way it reminded me of some of the stories that I've produced during NaNoWriMo where plots have randomly changed midway through because you've realised that you've not got enough to carry you to the end of the 50,000 words. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but it did mean that I found it tricky to keep track of who the good guys and bad guys were.

It's obviously the beginning of an interesting series, but it could do with a little bit of polishing to make it a really good read.… (mere)

I'm not sure what age-group this story is aimed at. The protagonist is 11 years old and there is talk of characters 'fancying' each other and plotlines that are a little dark even for 11 year olds but the general tone and writing seem to be meant for younger children (although the number of mistakes in the text and the poor use of language makes me loathe to let children read it at all).
The novel is about a magical world where most people have a 'magical gene' which allows them to perform magic, a small percentage of the population, like the main character, Cressida, cannot. She gets her hands on a magical book which activates her 'magic gene' and bonds with her so that only she has the ability to touch it and save the world from the evil Shadow Council. Along the way Cressida and her friend meet a host of magical creatures and are betrayed by those close to them. In fact some of the storyline relating to family issues are entirely bizarre and very dark (in my opinion, not suitable for young children). Think Harry Potter’s parents with an even more unpleasant twist and you will get the idea but whereas JK Rowling takes the time to deal with the emotions generated by traumatic events, this novel treats them fairly perfunctory and there is not even a mention at the end of the book, when their routine returns to normal and they are back at school, of what happens to Cressida’s friend, Joe, who’s now has no-one to look after him!
I found the first few chapters very one-dimensional and predictable and didn’t much like Cressida but the plot did get more exciting and draw me in for a while towards the middle. I still feel that Cressida barely did anything except rely on her friends to help her through but maybe that is the point?
Maybe a child would be captivated enough to read the next in the series but as an adult the characters were not sympathetic enough for me to care what happens to them.… (mere)