A boy named Aelfric lives by poaching royal game for his family. It’s illegal, and there are other ways in the world to make a living, but with a weak Robin Hood theme, the character is justified because the king is unpleasant and tyrannical anyway.
Here is a link to my review, under “Imani Bey” – which I did not repost because I, unfortunately, didn’t have much positive to say about the book.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13022723-unknown-book-13022723

In Pastures of Wonder by Kevin Ninomiya, a young girl, Sophia, finds herself slowed in her dreams of becoming an actor by naivety and by a learning disability. When a harsh teacher predicts failure for her in that area, she despairs for several years. But one day, she comes upon what she perceives as a message from God. She decides to try again, and succeeds.
And that is where the problem with the story starts. Sophia’s adolescence is written with eloquence and wit. However, her dependence on God is both touching and simplistic. She is shown a few scenes of difficulty and failure, but seemingly within a few pages she leaps into victory and the reader does not really get to see her gradual success. Thus it can be a little more difficult to sympathize with her in the later part of the story than it was in the parts that spoke of her childhood.
The book is written with a sweetly mystical air. However , one does not really get to see Sophia’s coming of age, which is more preached about than truly shown. Still, even that preaching is beautifully done, but the reader must be willing to excuse some flaws in characterization and development.

Jacob Vogel struggles to survive with hope. Unfortunately, he is hemmed in on all sides – the Anarchist Murmur, and the tyrannical Wizards who rule, are both, in a way, enemies to the common people, who create a neverending, self feeding cycle of Chaos and misery. Death and suicide are everyday happenings, despair is the rule, and resentment meets anyone who may seek to live with hope and self respect.
Jacob flees and finds a far better life. But he realizes that, whether he likes it or not, he will have to come out of his idyllic shell and fight for others against these evils.
This book is written with eloquence, an intelligent narrative voice and a satirical tone that is both touching and, sometimes, too dry to be believable. Often, the conflict seems to be of emotional and moral themes rather than really external, and, though that gives wonderful depth to the story, it also makes the exposition slow enough to potentially lose a reader’s interest.
The theme encouraging hope and a fight for the human spirit is well written, but it is the angst that accompanies it, and Jacob’s own personality, that gives it its flaw. While Jacob has a mixture of goodness and cynicism that makes him more believable, when he attempts to rise from his closet of philosophies and take action for a better life in the middle of the book, he becomes angsty and slightly pathetic . He encounters a hastily written romance and an idyllic love that does not suit him, and there he begins his downfall as a character.
All in all, I’d give it a four star rating, for the sheer eloquence and intelligence of the writing and the power of the theme, even if it greatly weakens before Jacob’s personality after awhile.

The author requested me to critique two sample chapters of his dragon / dinosaur story.
The beginning, with good description of surroundings, had potential. But the exposition was put in poor order. Emotion was described with dry, uncreative prose. There was little suspense, and too much crammed together.

Nahla Marks, a young college aged woman, lives with high expectations from black parents, though she is Caucasian, and becomes estranged from them when she fails to satisfy them career wise. She has strange seizures she tells no one about, and falls into an inexplicable attachment to a young man named Gideon. She then learns that she and Gideon are the products of egg fertilities caused by odd spheres from Africa, and have the powers of fallen angels.
Truthfully, the estrangement Nahla had from her parents would probably have made a more captivating conflict in my opinion. The fallen angel powers are overdone in stories , though the conflicts and concerns they produce are realistically pulled off. Rowe decided to use the Bible as background for the fallen angel plot.
The realization of powers is full of angst. The story has good self expression, but bland words flatten the emotional description. There can also be an awkward, somewhat unvarying narrative voice.

This is a blog for reviewing ebooks and book manuscripts, both published and unpublished. Email me at incisron@aol.com.
Story must be copied and pasted into the body of an email WITH the author’s name and email address. Attachments will not be opened!!!
Come and introduce yourself, if you’re a member!