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3.57 AVERAGE
3.57 AVERAGE
3.5/5
Genre: Fantasy
Overall summary: This was my first Salvatore book and his world building is superb! The story is slow, there is a lot of build up for future books. Our main protagonist Aoleyn is extremely likable and I loved watching her grow up. There are a few issues with this book, but I overall enjoyed it.
Trigger warning: Rape and abuse
Brief Description
The Wilderlands is a dangerous place inhabited by 8 tribes who live in pre-historic societies. The most mysterious and most powerful is the Usgar, a tribe that lives high in the mountain and uses crystal magic. Aoleyn is a young girl who is extremely connected with the song of the crystals that allow women to use their magic. We follow her as she grows up and comes into her power and attempts to smash the patriarchy she was born into.
Plot
The main plot revolved around Aoleyn growing up and learning magic as well as facing both a real monster that lives in the mountains known as the fossa and a figurative monster of the suffocating traditions and patriarchy of her mountain tribe. There was also a secondary plot involving an outsider trader named Talmadge and his trials and tribulations in and out of the mountain tribes. The plot was very slow paced, but it was still able to keep my attention due to the originality of the world and the strong characters Salvatore created. Most of the action of this book occurs in the later half when Aoleyn has come of age. She faces an undesirable arranged marriage, forced gender roles including violence, and hatred from the head of the coven. She also has a loving relationship with a slave boy in her tribe who remains alive only because the tribe thinks he is stupid and not a threat. Aoleyn discovers her love of the crystals and finds she is more powerful than any other woman in her tribe and she spends the second half of the book striving to be the strongest and most powerful so she can defend herself against the role she is placed into as a woman of her tribe. That being said the people of the Usgar are EXTREMELY violent people. They take what they want, keep slaves from the other tribes, and kill outsiders without regard for their lives at all. The other villages call the Usgar daemons, with their magically enhanced crystal spears and violent ways.
Talmadge on the other hand spends most of the book dealing with a life he took early on in the book. It forever marks the way he deals with people. He loves the lake tribes even through he is from the outside world and goes through a lot of love and loss throughout the book. While everything comes full circle for him by the end, not much happens to him throughout the book action wise, but he is built up for the books that come after this for sure. His story was a character study and I found it pretty interesting. I also loved the way his and Aoelyn’s story lines converged in the end, it worked really well.
Characters
By far Aoleyn was the most interesting character to follow. She grew up in this book and we followed her and her rambunctious free spirit as she took on the society and a few monsters along the way both figurative and literal. She has so much more to do now that she has come into her power and she was such a delight to follow. She has a wonderful relationship with the slave boy Thump which I hope will blossom into so much more in future books. He is also an interesting character that we get to see glimpses of his POV throughout the book. We also sometimes get to follow Aoleyn’s mentor/aunt who knows what Aoelyn is doomed to face and is very strict with her in her attempts to tame Aoleyn’s free spirit.
Talmadge was harder to connect with and less interesting, but had his own trauma to unpack and that showed up a lot in his character. He was aloof and spent a lot of time in his own head. We also don’t know too much of his back story before the start of the book, which makes him more mysterious.
World
I haven’t read any of Salvatore’s other books set in other parts of this world, but I must say this book does an amazing job isolating and describing the lake and mountain tribes. He describes their culture and magic, but leaves enough mystery for me to want more. He also is very good at looking at his world through the lenses of his characters and portraying what they know and don’t know to us. I feel like I am a part of that world as I am reading, which takes a true master to accomplish. He is even good at adding little details that truly flesh out the world even for readers who are unfamiliar with his other works.
Conclusion
This was a slow, but interesting read. If you are a fan of high epic fantasy which tends to be slow anyway maybe check this out. The world and Salvatore’s exploration of the world is very interesting. Though, again, if rape and abuse are triggers for you it might be best to sit this one out.
It's not Drizzt but it has potential. I think this book was probably 200 pages longer than it needed to be. Those first 250 pages just dragged along, almost didn't get thru them and was ready to set it aside but it finally picked up. I have the next 2 books already and I am trying to keep my hopes up but have been finding Salvatore to be getting extremely wordy in all his writings lately. :(
adventurous
challenging
dark
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is my first novel by R.A. Salvatore, and to be honest I only picked it up because I was approved for an ARC of the second novel in the series (having requested it without realizing it was a sequel.)
So what I loved: every female character of any kind of significance is a strong female character, which is pretty unusual for high fantasy written by white men. Typically you get one, maybe two, complex women - in this novel there are several. Conversely, the men are actually pretty stereotypical with one exception (this is not necessarily good, but an interesting observation.)
What was good: It was a good story and the magic system was pretty unique, if maybe a little too complicated for my taste.
What could use some work: The world building wasn't anything special and I really could have used a map of the larger continent, not just the Loch. It took far too long for the two viewpoints to finally converge... for a long time I was left to wonder what one had to do with the other since they didn't appear to be going in the same direction. This leads me to my next point, which is the plot wasn't as tightly woven as I would like - there seemed to be a lot of "extra" stuff, especially from Talmadge's story, that didn't serve the larger story arc.
Overall, a solid three stars and I will happily continue on with the series because I love Aoelyn and want to see where else her story goes.
So what I loved: every female character of any kind of significance is a strong female character, which is pretty unusual for high fantasy written by white men. Typically you get one, maybe two, complex women - in this novel there are several. Conversely, the men are actually pretty stereotypical with one exception (this is not necessarily good, but an interesting observation.)
What was good: It was a good story and the magic system was pretty unique, if maybe a little too complicated for my taste.
What could use some work: The world building wasn't anything special and I really could have used a map of the larger continent, not just the Loch. It took far too long for the two viewpoints to finally converge... for a long time I was left to wonder what one had to do with the other since they didn't appear to be going in the same direction. This leads me to my next point, which is the plot wasn't as tightly woven as I would like - there seemed to be a lot of "extra" stuff, especially from Talmadge's story, that didn't serve the larger story arc.
Overall, a solid three stars and I will happily continue on with the series because I love Aoelyn and want to see where else her story goes.
Just based on the last couple of chapters, this book might have been a promising start to a fantasy series I quite enjoy reading. Unfortunately it took a very long time to get there and the path was paved with so many things that made me really uncomfortable.
Usually I don't mind slow books - on the contratry I really like when authors take time to build, create and develope a world and characters to follow. And I did love the world building in regard to nature and atmosphere. I could totally get lost in the untamed, rural vastness of the landscape which felt really like it's own fleshed out character. But for the most part of the book nothing really much happens (and what happend was so brutal and horrible I often felt too sensitive to continue) so that the story flows aimlessly to an ending which then felt rushed.
Usually I don't mind slow books - on the contratry I really like when authors take time to build, create and develope a world and characters to follow. And I did love the world building in regard to nature and atmosphere. I could totally get lost in the untamed, rural vastness of the landscape which felt really like it's own fleshed out character. But for the most part of the book nothing really much happens (and what happend was so brutal and horrible I often felt too sensitive to continue) so that the story flows aimlessly to an ending which then felt rushed.
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I can't believe I finished but I have so many thoughts and I can't wait to share all of them with you. I definitely do not recommend this book to anyone.
I can't believe I finished but I have so many thoughts and I can't wait to share all of them with you. I definitely do not recommend this book to anyone.
Child of a Mad God is a different take on fantasy for R.A. Salvatore and I for one, believe it suits him. It's a blend of mystical, shamen-esque fantasy that incorporates some truly unique elements. Aoleyn and Talmadge are both great characters to follow and help set the stage for this new series.
DNF
so tired of reading books where everything and everyone is horrible for no reason. tw: rape, gang rape, sexual assault
so tired of reading books where everything and everyone is horrible for no reason. tw: rape, gang rape, sexual assault
I couldn’t even finish this. The treatment of the women in this was so awful. Almost every page, they were being raped, beaten, or demeaned.