Though it is clumsily written, with paper-thin characters and spotty descriptions, this is not the worst fantasy story I've read.

Where should I begin? How about at the beginning: nothing much happens in the first several chapters, and the chapter breaks themselves seem random. There's no hint of an arc of a story, just half-hearted exposition breaking a flat narrative. This happened, then that happened, then another thing happened. It was a chore to make it anywhere near the first point of conflict in the story. Once there, it doesn't even feel like much of a conflict.

The pace quickens a bit in the fifth chapter, but still nothing much happens. The only thing drawing the characters on is a weak motivation: find some guy (we find out who he is in chapter eleven) who was supposed to be at this town to do some ritual, but hasn't shown up yet. The story wends its way on, meandering back and forth as the River Folk go up and down the river on their errand. A pair of dwarve... I mean "Battleaxe Folk" join the gang. The story plods along, punctuated by some actually interesting brief stories told by the female dwar... uh, I mean, "Kindred," as the Battleaxe Folk are also known.

An ancient Pact between the River Folk and the Battleaxe Folk and the Faeries is broken, and some bad Faeries do some bad things, and some good Faeries do some bad things, and the king of the Faeries helps the river folk. There's a big fight that lasts for a couple chapters and then... the end.

If an editor saw this book at all, they didn't spend much time on it. A few choice quotes:
"Six gray-furred kittens squirmed deliciously."
"After a precarious moment, he regained his feet, years of boating experience coming in to save him."
and my personal favorite, the noisy muscles:
"... his biceps seemed to groan aloud. This groaning, however if it was audible, was entirely drowned out by the frightened bleating of the sheep..." and
"His muscles sang like the taunt [sic] wires of his fiddle..."

So, apart from a lack of the expected rise and fall of tension one expects from a story, awkward grammar, and a lackluster lack of description ("She produced another apple and a small sharp knife from her nondescript garment." and "She wore a black cloak, thigh-high boots and an old wide-brimmed hat of shapeless, colorless material." as two examples), the story actually ends up being not completely awful. However, it is just awful enough for me to utterly lose interest in any of the following books in the "series."

Oh, and as an added bonus, there are no Kindle chapter breaks or table of contents, so navigating the book is a chore.

As I say, I've seen worse. But not often. ( )