Witch Hunter

Title: Witch Hunter

Series: The Witch Hunter - book 1

Author: Virginia Boecker

Raing: 4 stars

Genre: Paranormal, Historical Fantasy

Number of Pages: 409

Publication Date: 2015

Publisher: Orchard Books

Summary: Elizabeth Grey may look harmless, but don't let that fool you. She can take out five necromancers with a single sword and slay a wizard at fifty paces.

But when she's found carrying witch's herbs, she is thrown into jail with no chance of escape. Only magic, which she's fought against all her life, can save her...

Now, with Elizabeth's chances of survival in the very hands of those she has been trained to fight, she faces an impossible choice.

This book has perhaps the most interesting premise I have come across in a long time. As soon as I picked this book up and read the back, I had to have it! The idea of reading a book where the main character is the witch hunter and the not the witch isn't that popular, not when the witches are in fact the good guys. Books where the main character is forced to reevaluate everything they have ever been taught are perhaps the books that I find the most appealing.

While the premise of this book was fantastic and the plot itself was interesting, I found that the writing itself let this book down. I didn't find Virginia Boecker to be have a particularly appealing writing style. She wrote in an almost simplistic or basic way. There were no lines that stood out, no creative metaphors and no impressive descriptions of scenes, characters or environments. However, Witch Hunter is her debut novel so it isn't surprising that there is room for improvement. Not many people can write a master piece on their first try.

My one complaint about the story line itself is in the way that Elizabeth Grey is described. Elizabeth is described as being a great witch hunter, the very best, an unstoppable force. Yet I found that we never quite got to see this in the book, Elizabeth seemed to be constantly run down, overwhelmed and only seemed to succeed when she had others to rely on or through the very fact that the author wrote the plot with her winning. However, because I did find the authors writing to be a little weak at times I feel that this would have come across better if she was a stronger writer.

I really look forward to seeing where this series goes next and how Virginia Boecker's writing improves.

City of Bones

Title: City of Bones

Series: The Mortal Instruments - book 1

Author: Cassandra Clare

Rating: 5 stars

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Number of Pages: 443

Publisher: Walker Books

Publication Date: 2007

Summary: It's after dark in New York City, and Clary Fray is seeing things. The best-looking guy in the night club just stabbed a boy to death - but the victim has vanished into thin air. Her mother has disappeared, and a hideous monster is lurking in her apartment. With her life spiraling into darkness, Clary realises that she has stumbled into an invisible war between ancient demonic forces and the secretive Shadowhunters - a war in which she has a fateful role to play...

First of all I think I should start off by saying that the Mortal Instruments is my favourite book series and Cassandra Clare is my favourite author, therefore anything and everything written in this post is totally bias :)

I picked up this book to read for two reasons. First I want to re-read all the books set in the Shadowhunter universe before the release of Lady Midnight in March and secondly because this months TBR challenge was to read a book that was either a TV or movie adaption and this series is both. The TV show premiered today and the movie was released in August 2013.

Cassandra Clare creates a fun and sexy world of Shadowhunters. Her characters are diverse, her plot lines filled with brilliant minor and major story lines. Even in just this first book of the series each of the characters face some major challenges, challenges that shape and change who they always thought they were. While most of the character development that occurs in this book isn't really seen in until City of Ashes the ending of this book doesn't just leave you with the cliff hanger of what is going to happen next, but how the characters are going to cope. And I have never read a book that has invested me in the characters as much as Cassandra Clare's writing does. This book is driven forward as much by a compelling story line as it is by an amazing set of characters.

Cassandra Clare's writing style, however, is what I love the most about her books. Cassandra has such a creative way of writing. She balance show and telling well and fills her writing with creative, witty and just plain funny metaphors and similes that brings the Shadowhunter world alive and off and the page. In fact all her dialogue is written in a fun and enjoyable way that doesn't take from the seriousness of the situation nor make what is happening unbelievable (especially from Jace).

“It wouldn't be my move," Jace agreed. "First the candy and flowers, then the apology letters, then the ravenous demon hordes. In that order.” 

“The meek may inherit the earth, but at the moment it belongs to the conceited. Like me.” 

“Just because you call an electric eel a rubber duck doesn't make it a rubber duck, does it? And God help the poor bastard who decides they want to take a bath with the duckie. (Jace Wayland)” 

“Sarcasm is the last refuge of the imaginatively bankrupt.” 

“Sorry, are you telling me that your demon-slaying buddies need to be driven to their next assignment with the forces of darkness by my mom?”

And that is just a small taster of some of the good lines in the book - this list doesn't even include some of the best. Mostly because I couldn't chose.

If you love Urban Fantasy, High Fantasy, any kind of fantasy, adventure, kick butt characters and books about worlds colliding this is totally for you. 

Tigana

Title: Tigana

Author: Guy Gavriel Kay

Rating: 4 stars

Genre: High Fantasy

Number of Pages: 692

Publication Date: 1990

Publisher: Harper Voyager

Summary: Eight of the nine provinces of the Peninusla of the Palm, on a world with two moons, have fallen to the warrior sorcerers Brandin of Ygrath and Alberico of Barbadior.

Brandin's younger son is slain in a battle with the principality of Tigana, which the grief-stricken sorcerer then destroys. After sweeping down and destroying the remnants of their army, burning their books and destroying their architectures and statuary, he makes it so that no one not born in the province can even its name.

Years later, a small band of survivors, lead by Alessan, last prince of Tigana's royal house, wages psychological warfare, planting seeds for the overthrow of the two tyrants. At the centre of these activities are Devin, a gifted young singer; Catriana, a young woman pursued by suspicions of her family's guilt; and Duke Sandre d'Astibar, a wily resistance leader thought dead.

Meanwhile, at Brandin's court, Dianora, his favourite concubine and - unknown to anyone, another survivor of Tigana - struggles between her growing love for the often gentle tyrant and her desire for vengeance. Gradually the scene is set for both conquers to destroy each other and free a land.

The thing that really stood out for me in this book was the world making. Mostly because rather than creating this great descriptive world, Gavriel Kay focused more on creating a culture, more so than any other book I have ever read. This book made you understand the importance of friendship, loyalty, oaths and religion to these people in such a way that it became as if you had actually seen it with your own eyes and encountered it rather than simply read about it. Very little was ever said about the physical world of the Palm outside of direct descriptions of where they were currently and to say that there were two moons.

The writing style of this book is extremely descriptive. Rather than saying what anything is, everything is told in an almost poetic way. While this made the writing give a lot more depth than a lot of books I also found that this made it difficult at times to follow the specifics of the story line. Because Tigana was written in a way that didn't always say what was happening you had to try and work much of the hints out yourself. While this is usually fine in a book as it helps bring creativity and a flourish to an authors work, at times I found there were too many descriptions and not enough direct writing that there was nothing to grasp a hold of and follow.

I also struggled quite a bit in the beginning of the novel, as I do with many high fantasy books, with the names. For some reasons fantasy authors always seem to pick one letter in the alphabet and give all the characters a name starting with this letter, the letter A in this case. Take into account that they are usually names that are not natural to us and they do begin to blur together. I was well passed half way in this massive novel before I could begin to fathom who was who.

The plot of this story moved very slowly. The first four fifths of this novel was Alessan and his rag tag group turning the western and eastern tyrants against each other. Alessan as a character is very intelligent and good at reading how others will react. While this makes most of his plans run smoothly and flawlessly in an entertaining read, it also caused the final battle to be rather anti-climatic. Of the 692 pages in this book the ending was a sudden turn around pages 620-30, all of a sudden everything went from a big lead up to the main event. Like all of Alessan's plan the final skirmish went off with few faults and at the end I kinda went 'is that it?'

But over all I have to congratulate Guy Gavriel Kay because this high fantasy novel is a stand alone. It isn't often you come across stand alone fantasies of any sort much less a high fantasy. Overall this book was fantastic. While its length was a little off putting especially when it was told slowly in a very descriptive and creative way, this only made the fact that it is a stand alone more impressive.

Top 5 Wednesday - Fandoms

For 2016 I have decided I will participate in as many Top 5 Wednesdays as possible. For January 6th the T5W topic is Your Top 5 Fandoms.

For me this topic started off relatively easy, two stood out more then any other but then things started to get difficult. How could I pick one over another when as fandoms by default I loved them all. So to make things easier on myself and not too unfair I figured I would go with the first 5 fandoms I every had.

1. This one was the easiest to pick and is perhaps on most lists and that is Harry Potter. I love all things HP whether it be books, movies, games, quizzes, or just hearing someone make a HP reference. HP fans are an unspoken unified group of people who bound instantly over a shared love of the series. Match J.K Rowling's great writing with a great group of fans and who wouldn't want to be apart of this fandom.

2. Heartland. This is probably a very different fandom than what most would chose (its not overly popular), and this series involves rescuing abused and neglected horses. Heartland is both a book series and a tv show (that is up to season 9). I started to read this series when I was about 11 or 12 and not long after I finished reading them the tv show began. Horses and books are my two great loves in life so its probably not surprising that a combination of the two made it onto my top 5.

3. The fandom which is probably the one that I am most greatly a fan of is anything relating to Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunters, specifically for me, The Mortal Instruments. These books were ultimately what made me discover that their was more to books, tv shows and movies than simply watching and reading them. After I finished the original trilogy of TMI I went looking for more anything of Cassandra Clare and that was when I discovered how far the love of a series can go through the creation of fandoms.

4. The Lord of the Rings quickly became a favourite of mine following the first 10 minutes of the first movie. After that I had to watch the next two and know about the books these fantastic movies were based off. Granted the books are little more slow but still the world and the characters are a great and unique bunch.

5. I was originally introduced to Stars Wars, begrudgingly, by my father who insisted it would be a great bonding activity to force his family to watch the movies with him. All six! We had to watch them in the original release order, you get the full effect that way, but by the end of the first one I had to know more. I am curious to see where the next set of movies go considering George Lucas once said that Star Wars was the story of Darth Vader, because Darth Vader isn't in the latest movies...but I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

Into the Woods

Title: Into the Woods

Author: Lyn Gardner

Rating: 4 stars

Genre: Children's, Fairy Tale Retelling, Adventure

Number of Pages: 428

Publication Date: 2006

Publisher: Corgi

Summary: Aurora, Storm and Any Eden are accidentally orphaned and left to fend for themselves, when they come under the unwanted attention of Dr DeWilde. The sinister Dr DeWilde is set on obtaining a pipe that Storm has inherited and the three sisters are forced to flee into the woods to escape him.

With Dr DeWilde close at their heels the three sisters are catapulted into a dangerous adventure to save their own lives and those of Piper Town.

Into the Woods is a mixed collection of fairy tale retellings combined into one story. This story incorporates Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel and many other favourite fairy tales to create a fantastical world filled with adventure and quick thinking heroines. Like all good fairy tales, Into the Woods is centered around a hero who must outwit the bad guy who is a threat to everyone by completing an adventure. As I started reading this story I was worried that all the characters and story lines they were introducing would never fit to together without losing the integrity of the original fairy tales, however, Gardner managed to subtly weave the different plot lines together and work each of the different fairy tale characters in a very believable way.

The thing that I loved the most about this book was one of the minor story lines that is carried throughout the book, which is Kit with his mixed personality. Kit is described as having one emerald green eye and one ice blue eye. Kit's eyes are the physical manifestation of the internal struggle he goes through. His green eye represents his want to be the hero or good guy while his blue eye represents the frozen portion of his heart that does more evil than good. Kit's situation gave the book a lot of emotional depth to the story line as well as providing much entertainment. While heroes are guaranteed to win in fairy tales, Kit's inner struggle left you questioning over which side would win. His character brought anguish and pain, and added to the depth of how real the characters over all were. As for entertainment; well every time Kit tried to do something good, his alter-ego would betray him and try to bring about the capture of the Eden sisters and when his alter-ego was beginning to corner the heroines, Kit would step in and reveal the path to freedom. It was like watching someone play chess against themselves...no one can win. My only wish for this book was that their wasn't more Kit.

Like all good fairy tales, Into the Woods has a moral to the story. In this case it is the balance between fun and work that Storm and Aurora learn through their adventures. Storm is wild in nature, she likes to make fire works and not do anything responsible. Aurora has always been the one given all the responsibility and as a result finds itemising the linen closet, dusting, and knitting and sewing to be highly entertaining endeavors. Throughout the course of the book the two sisters, while holding onto their wild and domestic personalities, learn to balance, They learn when it is ok to let go and have fun and when you have to take responsibility for whats happening.

If I had read this book as a children or early teen I would probably have loved this book and given it five stars, but being that little bit older I can only give it four.