Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.88 AVERAGE
3.88 AVERAGE
adventurous
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I've been recommended to read Michelle West/Sagara. What attracted me is she's said to write very character based books akin to Robin Hobb.
So I like Rath, jaded middle aged protagonist, betrayals and hurts unspecified cause but hinted at. Has skills to survive. Jewel, on the other hand.... Bleeding heart. Young. Idealistic. Has powers beyond her ken. This is where I'm torn. More Rath and less of Jewel and her band of ruffians, I'll keep on reading. Otherwise it looks like any other YA or younger fantasy fulfillment- instead of being young, helpless and alone, they'll form a band and fight evil, become powerful. No thanks.
So I like Rath, jaded middle aged protagonist, betrayals and hurts unspecified cause but hinted at. Has skills to survive. Jewel, on the other hand.... Bleeding heart. Young. Idealistic. Has powers beyond her ken. This is where I'm torn. More Rath and less of Jewel and her band of ruffians, I'll keep on reading. Otherwise it looks like any other YA or younger fantasy fulfillment- instead of being young, helpless and alone, they'll form a band and fight evil, become powerful. No thanks.
Just what I needed.
I pretty much agree with all the below reviews from the zero to one to five star ones.
It’s character driven fantasy with slow world and character building. Things move slowly and it’s immersive. Things are being set up for a long haul.
Trigger warning though: there is child rape and a child brothel
The writing is good enough that one of the MCs, Ararath isn’t very likeable so far, but it doesn’t matter. His point of view was more of a vehicle for the story to be told and move the plot along. At least, that’s how it looks to me right now.
I pretty much agree with all the below reviews from the zero to one to five star ones.
It’s character driven fantasy with slow world and character building. Things move slowly and it’s immersive. Things are being set up for a long haul.
Trigger warning though:
The writing is good enough that one of the MCs, Ararath isn’t very likeable so far, but it doesn’t matter. His point of view was more of a vehicle for the story to be told and move the plot along. At least, that’s how it looks to me right now.
I want to give this four stars... but I can't. I won't post spoilers here, but I am really, really not happy with the way one of the major plot points went down. This book is the start of a HUGE series. We have The House War books 1-3, then The Sun Sword 1-6, then The House War 4-8. I also understand that The Sun Sword books were written first so this is in a way a prequel. So what is written here is background material for what comes later. So I understand it. But I still really, really don't like it.
OK. Enough of that. The Hidden City. Hmmmmm. Think of this book as a John Wayne fantasy. You have a John Wayne (or Clint Eastwood if you prefer) type of character who very early on gets robbed by Shirley Temple. For some strange reason (which we will learn later, but no spoilers here), he decides to sort of adopt her. She then goes on to gather about her a tribe of... little rascals. So you have John Wayne as the father figure to Shirley Temple and the little rascals in a land of swords and magic. But throughout, the book never loses the feel of being a John Wayne novel. Seriously. It is pulled off quite well.
Michelle West has done an excellent job of world and character building in this book. Michelle West has a diverse set of preteen orphans and she has given them distinct personalities far better than Orson Scott Card did with Ender's Jeesh. There is a lot of dialogue and some beautiful descriptive narrative here but it is light on action. At some points the heavy dialogue/light action combo becomes distracting. There is a deeply emotional chapter-long conversation that takes place all while a knife is being held to the throat of a villain, and yet he does not once interrupt or contribute to the conversation.
As I said, the ending is horrible. I really did not like it. But I absolutely loved the journey to getting there. I am certainly going to read on and am hoping this is a good long series that will keep me busy for a good long while. But I might not get past book 2 if I find something similar happening again. So the jury is still out.
OK. Enough of that. The Hidden City. Hmmmmm. Think of this book as a John Wayne fantasy. You have a John Wayne (or Clint Eastwood if you prefer) type of character who very early on gets robbed by Shirley Temple. For some strange reason (which we will learn later, but no spoilers here), he decides to sort of adopt her. She then goes on to gather about her a tribe of... little rascals. So you have John Wayne as the father figure to Shirley Temple and the little rascals in a land of swords and magic. But throughout, the book never loses the feel of being a John Wayne novel. Seriously. It is pulled off quite well.
Michelle West has done an excellent job of world and character building in this book. Michelle West has a diverse set of preteen orphans and she has given them distinct personalities far better than Orson Scott Card did with Ender's Jeesh. There is a lot of dialogue and some beautiful descriptive narrative here but it is light on action. At some points the heavy dialogue/light action combo becomes distracting. There is a deeply emotional chapter-long conversation that takes place all while a knife is being held to the throat of a villain, and yet he does not once interrupt or contribute to the conversation.
As I said, the ending is horrible. I really did not like it. But I absolutely loved the journey to getting there. I am certainly going to read on and am hoping this is a good long series that will keep me busy for a good long while. But I might not get past book 2 if I find something similar happening again. So the jury is still out.
How..... in the hell did this escape me for so long? I mean, I've had it on my radar for quite a while. I even downloaded a sample onto my kindle ages ago, but for some reason, I never took the dive? I'm ashamed of myself. Horrified! Simply sick with the idea that it lay buried, untended for so long!!
This hits all those sweet spots for those that adore the 'found family' trope. It just vibes so well. It's slow flowing, so if that isn't your gig, you may not love it? But the pay off is tremendous. Another thing that may not hit other readers quite right is the fact that there is a lot of books in this series. There's also some branching books that are connected to this world too. Others may not love that, but ME? I'm beyond thrillllllled!!!! It's so difficult for me to find books I love, so when I do and I discover that there are many more where that comes from, I fly to the moon with glee. From what I have seen, they're all nice and chunky too. I am comfortable with this concept.
There is soooo many quotable quotes in this, so much great dialogue, philosophical debates and questions that we all have that are just dredged out into the open here. There's not a huge amount of info dumps here, just those instances that are absolutely necessary. But it doesn't feel invasive to the reader.
Lots of mystery to keep readers interested, even though this is obviously the start to a grand epic.
The mystery of why a nobleman would abandon his life of luxury for a rough live on the street, about magic and mages and demons and the selfishness of people.
SOOOO GOOD!!!!
This hits all those sweet spots for those that adore the 'found family' trope. It just vibes so well. It's slow flowing, so if that isn't your gig, you may not love it? But the pay off is tremendous. Another thing that may not hit other readers quite right is the fact that there is a lot of books in this series. There's also some branching books that are connected to this world too. Others may not love that, but ME? I'm beyond thrillllllled!!!! It's so difficult for me to find books I love, so when I do and I discover that there are many more where that comes from, I fly to the moon with glee. From what I have seen, they're all nice and chunky too. I am comfortable with this concept.
There is soooo many quotable quotes in this, so much great dialogue, philosophical debates and questions that we all have that are just dredged out into the open here. There's not a huge amount of info dumps here, just those instances that are absolutely necessary. But it doesn't feel invasive to the reader.
Lots of mystery to keep readers interested, even though this is obviously the start to a grand epic.
The mystery of why a nobleman would abandon his life of luxury for a rough live on the street, about magic and mages and demons and the selfishness of people.
SOOOO GOOD!!!!
I don't know what this will be like for future readers who take all of these books in internal chronological order. Me, I've read all the other related series already. So even on the first time through, the plot was something like coming back to a book you've already read. If you're not someone who ever does that, maybe this won't do all that much for you. But why I reread books - why I'm rereading this one right now, actually - is for the writing and the characters. And the more time we spend with Rath, knowing where this is all heading .... aah, it's heartbreak. Maybe inevitable in some form or other, but still. Plus Jewel and all the others. Time in their company is well spent.
Overall I enjoyed the main characters by the end of the novel, but it seemed to take a while to really hit its stride, with a lot of extra words. I am intrigued by the world and may continue to see if further books are a bit snappier.
At Rath’s age, the past was a bitter terrain, and the elements that loomed large cast sharp shadows along the thin edge between history and story. He could not be certain which of the two drove him; the facts – for he prided himself on rationality – or the emotions those facts evoked; the certain sense that he had made his choice, and must abide by it, or make a lie of the whole of his adult life, or the gnawing uncertainty that the choice itself was suspect, that pride, with its bright and bitter edge, held him now, cutting him and strengthening him, always with cost.
I picked up this book out of the dollar bin clearance rack at a used bookstore on a total whim and I’m glad I did. I’d never heard of the series or the author and it was only later when I got home and did some research that I realized that I was, in fact, familiar with the author. I just knew her under the name [a:Michelle Sagara|7031278|Michelle Sagara|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1365192047p2/7031278.jpg], the name under which she writes the Chronicles of Elantra series. Now, I read the first book in that series years ago and didn’t care for it enough to continue with it. I liked this book quite a bit, however, so I do plan to continue this one for the foreseeable future.
It’s a prequel I guess, of sorts, to the author’s Sun Sword series. According to the author, the first three books in the House War series take place before the Sun Sword series, even though they were published after the Sun Sword series was completed. So, it’s the old quandary of what reading order to follow: publication order vs chronological order. Me? I’m all about reading chronologically whenever possible.
No lesson ever went one way; lessons were not like rivers, flowing toward the ocean. They were, like his sword, a thing of two edges. He was learning, once again, to live in the world.
This is the story of Ararath Handernesse, Rath for short. Though his age is never specifically stated, I gather that he’s somewhere in the upper range of “middle age”. He’s a man who has turned his back on his past and who now earns a living in the poorer parts of the city finding and selling antiquities. His reasons for walking away from his former life are not immediately known but they are hinted at just enough to make the reader want to know more and the slowly peeled back layers make for satisfying discovery. When his path crosses that of Jewel ‘Jay’ Markess, a ten-year-old orphan eking out a living on the street, Rath is, against his better judgement, intrigued enough to take her in. As anyone who has ever had children can attest, once kids enter the scene, one’s life is never the same. So it is with Rath, who finds that Jewel functions as an oftentimes uncomfortable mirror for him and his life’s choices, both past and current.
This is also Jewel’s story and if she never comes across like a ten-year-old child – and she definitely does not (more like a 30-year-old) – there are subtle hints in the narrative that imply there are reasons why this is so. Generally speaking, when reading fantasy books that start a major protagonist off as a child I tend to not like the coming-of-age portion of the story very much. Here, however, I found myself quite interested and invested in Jewel and her choices. Perhaps part of that is, again, the fact that she never comes across like a true child but I also just respected her sheer practicality and her quiet strength. She’s not a fighter and she neither enjoys nor looks forward to inflicting violence, even when she knows it’s necessary. She’s, so far anyway, shaping up to be the type of heroine who demonstrates the myriad other ways that a female character can be strong that don’t necessarily involve being a weapons master or an expert in martial arts.
This isn’t an action heavy book though there are some fight sequences and some tense moments. What the story does do, and does quite well in my humble opinion, is examine the psyches of both Rath and Jewel, in addition to a few of the other secondary characters. I always appreciate those deeper dives into what makes the characters tick, to better understand why they do the things they do, and why they make the choices they make. In this manner, this book is definitely more of a character driven story rather than an action or a plot driven one.
That said, this book is clearly setting up a longer plot arc as Rath and Jewel find themselves bumping up against darker forces that appear to be marshalling on the peripheries of their society. We get some tantalizing tidbits about the history of the culture and the land that just beg to be expanded upon so hopefully additional installments will continue to add to the world building started here. Overall I really enjoyed reading this book, both the writing style and the characters kept me engaged from start to finish and I absolutely want to see where they all go from here. I’m especially hoping I get to meet one character in particular who, although mentioned several times, never made an appearance.
This was the better way: to find joy, to find the single beam of light in the darkness; to see it, know it, absorb it. To know that it was just as real as the bad things; that the bad did not destroy all good.
I picked up this book out of the dollar bin clearance rack at a used bookstore on a total whim and I’m glad I did. I’d never heard of the series or the author and it was only later when I got home and did some research that I realized that I was, in fact, familiar with the author. I just knew her under the name [a:Michelle Sagara|7031278|Michelle Sagara|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1365192047p2/7031278.jpg], the name under which she writes the Chronicles of Elantra series. Now, I read the first book in that series years ago and didn’t care for it enough to continue with it. I liked this book quite a bit, however, so I do plan to continue this one for the foreseeable future.
It’s a prequel I guess, of sorts, to the author’s Sun Sword series. According to the author, the first three books in the House War series take place before the Sun Sword series, even though they were published after the Sun Sword series was completed. So, it’s the old quandary of what reading order to follow: publication order vs chronological order. Me? I’m all about reading chronologically whenever possible.
No lesson ever went one way; lessons were not like rivers, flowing toward the ocean. They were, like his sword, a thing of two edges. He was learning, once again, to live in the world.
This is the story of Ararath Handernesse, Rath for short. Though his age is never specifically stated, I gather that he’s somewhere in the upper range of “middle age”. He’s a man who has turned his back on his past and who now earns a living in the poorer parts of the city finding and selling antiquities. His reasons for walking away from his former life are not immediately known but they are hinted at just enough to make the reader want to know more and the slowly peeled back layers make for satisfying discovery. When his path crosses that of Jewel ‘Jay’ Markess, a ten-year-old orphan eking out a living on the street, Rath is, against his better judgement, intrigued enough to take her in. As anyone who has ever had children can attest, once kids enter the scene, one’s life is never the same. So it is with Rath, who finds that Jewel functions as an oftentimes uncomfortable mirror for him and his life’s choices, both past and current.
This is also Jewel’s story and if she never comes across like a ten-year-old child – and she definitely does not (more like a 30-year-old) – there are subtle hints in the narrative that imply there are reasons why this is so. Generally speaking, when reading fantasy books that start a major protagonist off as a child I tend to not like the coming-of-age portion of the story very much. Here, however, I found myself quite interested and invested in Jewel and her choices. Perhaps part of that is, again, the fact that she never comes across like a true child but I also just respected her sheer practicality and her quiet strength. She’s not a fighter and she neither enjoys nor looks forward to inflicting violence, even when she knows it’s necessary. She’s, so far anyway, shaping up to be the type of heroine who demonstrates the myriad other ways that a female character can be strong that don’t necessarily involve being a weapons master or an expert in martial arts.
This isn’t an action heavy book though there are some fight sequences and some tense moments. What the story does do, and does quite well in my humble opinion, is examine the psyches of both Rath and Jewel, in addition to a few of the other secondary characters. I always appreciate those deeper dives into what makes the characters tick, to better understand why they do the things they do, and why they make the choices they make. In this manner, this book is definitely more of a character driven story rather than an action or a plot driven one.
That said, this book is clearly setting up a longer plot arc as Rath and Jewel find themselves bumping up against darker forces that appear to be marshalling on the peripheries of their society. We get some tantalizing tidbits about the history of the culture and the land that just beg to be expanded upon so hopefully additional installments will continue to add to the world building started here. Overall I really enjoyed reading this book, both the writing style and the characters kept me engaged from start to finish and I absolutely want to see where they all go from here. I’m especially hoping I get to meet one character in particular who, although mentioned several times, never made an appearance.
This was the better way: to find joy, to find the single beam of light in the darkness; to see it, know it, absorb it. To know that it was just as real as the bad things; that the bad did not destroy all good.
DNF.
Man, this book stated out with such promise and then dropped into the toilet. Will not be reading book 2.
Man, this book stated out with such promise and then dropped into the toilet. Will not be reading book 2.
