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3.62 AVERAGE
3.62 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Age of Ash by Daniel Abraham is book one in The Kithamar Trilogy. It also happens to fits perfectly in the March Mavericks Readathon with “takes place in another world” prompt. I really enjoyed the world building, political intrigue, magic and plot as a whole. The characters, however, I could not connect with. Instead, I often felt frustrated with their actions and behaviours, as I do with YA novels. This is somewhat disappointing, since Age of Ash has all of the elements for a fantastic epic fantasy series.
Overall, it just missed the mark. However, if you enjoy epic fantasy with a little YA edge, Age of Ash might be worth a read.
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
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:
Yes
Not the best start to a series, with some pretty derivative worldbuilding and a main character I got sick of really fast, but I will read the second book. This may be unfair to other series starters that I've rated three stars but had no desire to continue the series, but I've read and enjoyed a Daniel Abraham series before--The Dagger and Coin--so I'm giving this series another chance. It could very well get better as it goes along.
3 stars, Metaphorosis Reviews
Summary
Kithamar is an ancient city, embodied in its ruler. But its plans have gone astray, and its current incarnation is powerless. Caught up in the machinations of would-be leaders are a young street thief and her cohort.
Review
I first came across Daniel Abraham via his A Shadow in Summer, remaindered in a cut-price bookstore. I took a chance on it and loved it. I thought the idea was genius, the writing incredible – smooth, intriguing, evocative. The rest of that series, the Long Price Quartet, was almost as good, and I felt that thrill of having discovered a talented new author.
When I bought the first book of his next series, The Dragon’s Path, though, I wasn’t as taken with it. It was fine, but I never got around to getting the next book. I tried again, with Leviathan Wakes, the first book of the now-popular Expanse series. I didn’t care for it, and liked the video series even less. Still, I’m relatively tenacious/loyal to authors I like, so I picked up Age of Ash with enthusiasm. Sadly, it was another letdown. I’ve reached the point, at last, where I’ll likely look at Abraham’s next offering with more skepticism than joy.
There’s nothing technically wrong with Age of Ash. The overall theme – an embodied city – is only a step away from the embodied poems of the Long Price Quartet, but it’s a step in a very familiar direction. The prose is sound, the plot carefully mapped, the character arcs graphed. But it’s the characters where the book goes wrong for me. They’re complete, but to my mind very clinical – almost devoid of true emotion. We hear about their emotions, and the effects of those emotions, but there are only a couple of cases when we see or feel anything ourselves. While the story is structured around Alys, her friend Sammish is the only character I ever much cared about, and she’s almost aggressively shown as a supporting actor.
Without that engagement and investment in the key characters, I never really cared much about what was happening. It was interesting in a mechanical way, but the book left me largely unmoved. There’s a slight pickup in the ending, which has some nice touches, but it wasn’t enough to carry the book, and I won’t be going on to the sequels.
I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.
Summary
Kithamar is an ancient city, embodied in its ruler. But its plans have gone astray, and its current incarnation is powerless. Caught up in the machinations of would-be leaders are a young street thief and her cohort.
Review
I first came across Daniel Abraham via his A Shadow in Summer, remaindered in a cut-price bookstore. I took a chance on it and loved it. I thought the idea was genius, the writing incredible – smooth, intriguing, evocative. The rest of that series, the Long Price Quartet, was almost as good, and I felt that thrill of having discovered a talented new author.
When I bought the first book of his next series, The Dragon’s Path, though, I wasn’t as taken with it. It was fine, but I never got around to getting the next book. I tried again, with Leviathan Wakes, the first book of the now-popular Expanse series. I didn’t care for it, and liked the video series even less. Still, I’m relatively tenacious/loyal to authors I like, so I picked up Age of Ash with enthusiasm. Sadly, it was another letdown. I’ve reached the point, at last, where I’ll likely look at Abraham’s next offering with more skepticism than joy.
There’s nothing technically wrong with Age of Ash. The overall theme – an embodied city – is only a step away from the embodied poems of the Long Price Quartet, but it’s a step in a very familiar direction. The prose is sound, the plot carefully mapped, the character arcs graphed. But it’s the characters where the book goes wrong for me. They’re complete, but to my mind very clinical – almost devoid of true emotion. We hear about their emotions, and the effects of those emotions, but there are only a couple of cases when we see or feel anything ourselves. While the story is structured around Alys, her friend Sammish is the only character I ever much cared about, and she’s almost aggressively shown as a supporting actor.
Without that engagement and investment in the key characters, I never really cared much about what was happening. It was interesting in a mechanical way, but the book left me largely unmoved. There’s a slight pickup in the ending, which has some nice touches, but it wasn’t enough to carry the book, and I won’t be going on to the sequels.
I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Grief, Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Child death, Confinement, Slavery, Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Murder, Injury/Injury detail