It took me three attempts to actually get into the book. I had a mild problem connecting the story to the cover from the first page. How can that possibly be? you ask. Well, the main character, whom the pictured young woman on the cover represents (she hasn't changed much in the newer cover image) is, well, a lot whiter than described in the book. In the book she's described as having red toned skin akin to the iron rich earth in the mountain her people live on. White chick on the cover, while beautiful, does not appropriately represent the character and I kind of hate that.
The other problem I had was with the text in the first handful of pages. It was clipped, sentences short and reminiscent of that stereotypical cadence of North American indigenous (indians) peoples as they are seen in old black and white western movies. For real. I don't know if it was intentional, I suspect it was, but it was hard to get into. It should be noted that this book does not, in fact, take place in North America, by the way.
Things changed dramatically when the action started and the character's life is put on an altogether different course than it had been going. The cadence issues seemed to disappear as the author jumped into action and emotion and I, the reader, was carried along for a ride I wasn't prepared to put down when the kids kept coming around for lap cuddles.
One of the things on the back cover I noticed when I got it in the mail was the comparison of this book to Clan of the Cave Bear, among other books. As someone who has read and reread the Children of the Earth series I was sort of curious how this would play out. It turns out the similarity is isolated to the main character being female, from a somewhat primitive people and with an affinity for horses. That's it. Nothing else feels at all related. In actuality, I couldn't stop feeling like this book was more closely akin to Battlefield Earth of all things. With a healthy dose of The Island of Dr. Monroe scattered here and there. I suspect the latter affiliation will come into play in future books, it was mentioned once or twice but my brain had already lept to the conclusion. The overtones of Battlefield Earth I felt throughout were obvious: primitive people living on an outskirt land turn out to be the descendants of an advanced species (perhaps our time period, perhaps later) and are driven to near extinction by another species; main character is captured and becomes almost a pet of the other species and is taught her own language by them - although rather than being held in human cattle pens she is living in the lap of luxury with the illusion of freedom to leave when she likes.
Don't get me wrong, I loved the book. I'm just saying it should perhaps have been pointed out that it is more like Battlefield Earth than Clan of the Cave Bear. There are enough unique qualities of this book that make me look forward to the second installment - which will probably come next year since this book is only hitting the stores this month.
If you like fantasy books or sci fi books, I recommend it.
Obviously I haven't read it, but I saw the cover image somewhere else recently and my first thought was cheeeeeese. Why can't fantasy/sci-fi books have less lame covers?
ReplyDeleteI think it's because cover artists want to convey the story elements and the genre and don"t know how else to do it. In this particular cover image you get the main character, her favorite horse - who is important to the storyline - and three buck centaurs - two of which I recognize as specific characters (but tattoo boy is an anomaly) - who are important to the main character. It might have been more interesting if the artist had tried to create the kind of art deco style illustration that is described as being all over the Highlander walls, floors, ceilings, etc - they are super lavish.
ReplyDeleteOh hey, I cataloged that. I had to have the author field changed because she dropped the Ross. Might be worth a read! I'll have to check it out.
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