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A review by lifeinthebooklane
Beyond by Mercedes Lackey
3.0
I was absolutely thrilled to be able to take a step back in time and revisit the world of Valdemar. After first discovering these books in the early 90's I was immediately a fan, though I haven't read any more for a good 20 or so years. It was wonderful to discover the writing was as pleasing as I remembered and I soon found myself falling back in love with this world.
The book wasn't perfect, but then no book ever is and you definitely can't please all of the people all of the time. The pace was a little too slow and meandering at times, but because I am a character driven reader it didn't spoil the story for me. What I would have really liked to see were flawed characters - this had an almost "Disney" feel where the good guys were all perfect and the bad guys were somewhat caricaturish and oft portrayed as stupid. Stupid people do not rise to positions of power. I've clearly grown up in those intervening years and I just wanted and needed a little more depth to my protagonists.
That said I'm still a big fan of this series and will definitely continue reading it!
The book wasn't perfect, but then no book ever is and you definitely can't please all of the people all of the time. The pace was a little too slow and meandering at times, but because I am a character driven reader it didn't spoil the story for me. What I would have really liked to see were flawed characters - this had an almost "Disney" feel where the good guys were all perfect and the bad guys were somewhat caricaturish and oft portrayed as stupid. Stupid people do not rise to positions of power. I've clearly grown up in those intervening years and I just wanted and needed a little more depth to my protagonists.
That said I'm still a big fan of this series and will definitely continue reading it!