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rootytootyrissa 's review for:
The Waking Fire
by Anthony Ryan
WELL THAT WAS FUN.
Man, this tickled all my nerdy, fantasy-loving, geeky ol' bones. This book has so many things that I enjoy in a story--adventures, strong female characters, mysteries, naval battles, pirates, spooky gore, spies, and did I mention DRAGONS?! Not only that, but in having all these things, they were done WELL. I'll admit I'm a bit biased in my dragon-loving ways, which started when I was a much younger lass. But couple this story with all the elements I've mentioned, and you've got yourself a kick-ass tale of adventuring, of battles waged, of mysteries solved, of obsession and betrayal--and dragons just wreckin' everybody!! Yeah!!
Some books take a while to warm up, especially long, ponderous fantasy novels. Not so for The Waking Fire. We begin with a lengthy, marvelously proper (think Victorian-posh sort of language), first-hand account of a horrendous accident that involves, you guessed it, a dragon. The letter sets a lot of the tone for the story. First of all it explains how and why this event came to be, who are the some of the players, and most importantly, that dragons are wicked awesome and totally brutal (you can't really blame them in this story, because they are sort of harvested for their blood. Yeah, there's that). To put it simply, a dragon gets loose through some mysterious circumstances-- a woman dies, a child disappears, countless more are killed or injured, the town is wrecked. The dragon is eventually killed, but the mystery remains. Who was the woman who started this? Where did the child go? Why did the dragon seem like it was fleeing from something?
When the next chapter to that introduced a ballin' spy-lady, I was hooked. This book is quite lengthy, and I found myself eating the story up so quickly that at times I had to stop and go back to figure out what the heck was going on, having missed an important detail. There are three alternating characters with entirely different (although sometimes crossing) story lines, but each one have their own voices in their professions: naval officer, spy, and thief. Don't like one of those? Just give it a few pages, and before long you're back with one of the others in the alternating chapters! For me though, I enjoyed each individual story and had no problem keeping up with what was going on. I also thought each character was well-crafted. Some stories feature characters who all sound the same regardless of who they are or what they do. Not so The Waking Fire!
Ultimately this story was excellent good fun. If you're looking for a dash of Indiana Jones, a jot of Tomb Raider, and a hefty dose of Victorian-inspired DRAGON, give this one a whirl. If you're as geeky as me, you probably won't regret it!
Man, this tickled all my nerdy, fantasy-loving, geeky ol' bones. This book has so many things that I enjoy in a story--adventures, strong female characters, mysteries, naval battles, pirates, spooky gore, spies, and did I mention DRAGONS?! Not only that, but in having all these things, they were done WELL. I'll admit I'm a bit biased in my dragon-loving ways, which started when I was a much younger lass. But couple this story with all the elements I've mentioned, and you've got yourself a kick-ass tale of adventuring, of battles waged, of mysteries solved, of obsession and betrayal--and dragons just wreckin' everybody!! Yeah!!
Some books take a while to warm up, especially long, ponderous fantasy novels. Not so for The Waking Fire. We begin with a lengthy, marvelously proper (think Victorian-posh sort of language), first-hand account of a horrendous accident that involves, you guessed it, a dragon. The letter sets a lot of the tone for the story. First of all it explains how and why this event came to be, who are the some of the players, and most importantly, that dragons are wicked awesome and totally brutal (you can't really blame them in this story, because they are sort of harvested for their blood. Yeah, there's that). To put it simply, a dragon gets loose through some mysterious circumstances-- a woman dies, a child disappears, countless more are killed or injured, the town is wrecked. The dragon is eventually killed, but the mystery remains. Who was the woman who started this? Where did the child go? Why did the dragon seem like it was fleeing from something?
When the next chapter to that introduced a ballin' spy-lady, I was hooked. This book is quite lengthy, and I found myself eating the story up so quickly that at times I had to stop and go back to figure out what the heck was going on, having missed an important detail. There are three alternating characters with entirely different (although sometimes crossing) story lines, but each one have their own voices in their professions: naval officer, spy, and thief. Don't like one of those? Just give it a few pages, and before long you're back with one of the others in the alternating chapters! For me though, I enjoyed each individual story and had no problem keeping up with what was going on. I also thought each character was well-crafted. Some stories feature characters who all sound the same regardless of who they are or what they do. Not so The Waking Fire!
Ultimately this story was excellent good fun. If you're looking for a dash of Indiana Jones, a jot of Tomb Raider, and a hefty dose of Victorian-inspired DRAGON, give this one a whirl. If you're as geeky as me, you probably won't regret it!