Reviews

The world isn't quite as interesting as the Raksura books. I like Tremaine as a character a lot, and Ilias and Giliead's relationship is great. Wells is pretty good at characters who toe the line of fantasy cliche but stay just on the right side to be human, convincing, and interesting. A large part of that is the dialog, which is not "clever" in the Whedonesque way, but frequently surprising and charming. That said, this was kind of a slow read, and several of the action sequences felt like reading a video game walk through. I'll read the others and hope they improve.

flexmentallo's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

This is just really solid old school fantasy. Definitely glad people finally pushed me into Wells' work last year, she's pretty delightful. It's filled with tropes I normally hate, but Wells' strength in character writing, world building, and adventure pacing is just too good here.

mary_soon_lee's review

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3.0

This is the first book in a fantasy trilogy. The one sentence summary is that I enjoyed this but didn't love it. I found the opening a lovely hook, but became less engaged soon after that and remained that way for over a hundred pages.

Spoiler

The two principal point-of-view characters come from different worlds, and I found the switches in tone and background somewhat jarring. Indeed, had I not been a fan of other books by Martha Wells, I might have given up on this. But I persisted, and, around a third of the way through the book, perhaps closer to halfway through, I warmed up to both characters enough to start properly enjoying it.

It's very possible I would have liked this better had my expectations been lower. Starting in late 2018, I became a fan of Wells's Murderbot science fiction stories. Then, two and a half months ago, I began reading her fantasy series about the Raksura (first book "The Cloud Roads") and I loved the Raksura even more than Murderbot. Wells is a very skillful, very imaginative author with great breadth. While I found "The Wizard Hunters" less appealing than the Raksura or Murderbot, other readers may find quite otherwise.

About my reviews: I try to review every book I read, including those that I don't end up enjoying. The reviews are not scholarly, but just indicate my reaction as a reader, reading being my addiction. I am miserly with 5-star reviews; 4 stars means I liked a book very much; 3 stars means I liked it; 2 stars means I didn't like it (though often the 2-star books are very popular with other readers and/or are by authors whose other work I've loved).

applesapplesapples's review

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adventurous slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No

3.5

jdreadit's review against another edition

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adventurous funny hopeful mysterious medium-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

4.25

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