Green Rider - A Review

Publisher: DAW
464 pages

This is Kristen Britain's first book in this series. I think it's a good first effort, but I feel that she missed a few things that really would have made it stand out.

As fantasies go, it's a standard, "youngin' who doesn't know she has magic powers" type of story, but that's not necessarily bad. Every now and then I like to read stuff like this because, in the right hands, I can be transported away from the present and can become the MC and live vicariously through that character.

Reminds Me of Tolkien

And Ms. Britain says in her acknowledgments that she was introduced to The Lord of the Rings at a young age, and it's obvious (at least to me and some Amazon reviewers) that she took a number of things from LOTR.

Not that that's a bad thing - and she doesn't cleave onto it like other writers have. (If you're going to be heavily influenced by past writers, at least make your writing your own. That includes invented beasts and invented languages.)

The Story

Karigan G'ladheon (yes, the dreaded apostrophe!) is expelled from school and runs off into the nearby forest. A Green Rider - a rider who couriers messages to and fro - emerges with black arrows in his back. He tells Karigan that she must get the message bag to the king; an important message is within, and the messenger knows he's not going to make it.

All sorts of magic happens to Karigan, almost from the get-go, although she doesn't understand why. She touches a brooch that she gets from the rider, wishing herself invisible when some men start following her (um, they don't want to ask her to dance ;-)).

She manages to get out of that one, coming to with two elderly ladies checking her out, Miss Bayberry and Miss Bunchberry.

(For LOTR fans - these are the equivalent of Tom Bombadill.)

They live in an interesting house, inhabited by ghosts, telling Karigan that their father was interested in magic and picked up all sorts of magical paraphanelia over the years. She's deposited in a room by herself, picking up a moonstone that lights up at her touch (that hadn't lit up - ever - for the Berry sisters), wandering over to a telescope.

(Think of the telescope as Galadriel's mirror - that basin in the movie that Frodo looks into and sees things that may come into being - or not.)

This has the same affect on Karigan - she sees people and events, but such people and events will only happen if her life continues as it is. They see Karigan off, giving her a couple of magical things that they hope will help her, if she needs them. (Of course she uses them.)

I would've liked to have seen these characters developed more, as they were quite fun (two spinster aunts, with impeccable manners? Yeah, works for me.) Karigan gets involved with a couple of brigands who tie her up and push her along to what Karigan thinks is going to be her death.

She finds out that there's some kind of intrigue going on in Sacor City, which is where the king is. What exactly that intrigue is, is what the story ultimately is about. (Yes, magic is involved, as well as gameboard called Intrigue, believe it or not.)

The Final Verdict

The last 40 pages or so really dragged for me. I skimmed a lot, but I managed to figure out that some of it was important.

If Ms. Britain had developed the spinsters and a couple of the other characters (the female brigand was pretty well done, though), I think I would have enjoyed this even more. Also, cutting out a lot of words near the end of the book also would have made it more enjoyable.

I give it a C because it's a good first effort. Whether I'll read the rest in the series - don't know as yet. This one is a standalone, thank goodness, so if I decide to pass on the rest of the books, I haven't lost anything.

All in all, an enjoyable read, but it could have been rendered a tad better than it was.

~Nancy Beck

Green Rider - A Review

Publisher: DAW
464 pages

This is Kristen Britain's first book in this series. I think it's a good first effort, but I feel that she missed a few things that really would have made it stand out.

As fantasies go, it's a standard, "youngin' who doesn't know she has magic powers" type of story, but that's not necessarily bad. Every now and then I like to read stuff like this because, in the right hands, I can be transported away from the present and can become the MC and live vicariously through that character.

Reminds Me of Tolkien

And Ms. Britain says in her acknowledgments that she was introduced to The Lord of the Rings at a young age, and it's obvious (at least to me and some Amazon reviewers) that she took a number of things from LOTR.

Not that that's a bad thing - and she doesn't cleave onto it like other writers have. (If you're going to be heavily influenced by past writers, at least make your writing your own. That includes invented beasts and invented languages.)

The Story

Karigan G'ladheon (yes, the dreaded apostrophe!) is expelled from school and runs off into the nearby forest. A Green Rider - a rider who couriers messages to and fro - emerges with black arrows in his back. He tells Karigan that she must get the message bag to the king; an important message is within, and the messenger knows he's not going to make it.

All sorts of magic happens to Karigan, almost from the get-go, although she doesn't understand why. She touches a brooch that she gets from the rider, wishing herself invisible when some men start following her (um, they don't want to ask her to dance ;-)).

She manages to get out of that one, coming to with two elderly ladies checking her out, Miss Bayberry and Miss Bunchberry.

(For LOTR fans - these are the equivalent of Tom Bombadill.)

They live in an interesting house, inhabited by ghosts, telling Karigan that their father was interested in magic and picked up all sorts of magical paraphanelia over the years. She's deposited in a room by herself, picking up a moonstone that lights up at her touch (that hadn't lit up - ever - for the Berry sisters), wandering over to a telescope.

(Think of the telescope as Galadriel's mirror - that basin in the movie that Frodo looks into and sees things that may come into being - or not.)

This has the same affect on Karigan - she sees people and events, but such people and events will only happen if her life continues as it is. They see Karigan off, giving her a couple of magical things that they hope will help her, if she needs them. (Of course she uses them.)

I would've liked to have seen these characters developed more, as they were quite fun (two spinster aunts, with impeccable manners? Yeah, works for me.) Karigan gets involved with a couple of brigands who tie her up and push her along to what Karigan thinks is going to be her death.

She finds out that there's some kind of intrigue going on in Sacor City, which is where the king is. What exactly that intrigue is, is what the story ultimately is about. (Yes, magic is involved, as well as gameboard called Intrigue, believe it or not.)

The Final Verdict

The last 40 pages or so really dragged for me. I skimmed a lot, but I managed to figure out that some of it was important.

If Ms. Britain had developed the spinsters and a couple of the other characters (the female brigand was pretty well done, though), I think I would have enjoyed this even more. Also, cutting out a lot of words near the end of the book also would have made it more enjoyable.

I give it a C because it's a good first effort. Whether I'll read the rest in the series - don't know as yet. This one is a standalone, thank goodness, so if I decide to pass on the rest of the books, I haven't lost anything.

All in all, an enjoyable read, but it could have been rendered a tad better than it was.

~Nancy Beck

The da Vinci Code - A Review

Anchor, 496 pages

Yeah, I finally got around to reading this, finishing it this morning. I generally stay away from hyped books because I figure the hype is over the top. If I do decide to read a bestseller, I usually wait months or years to see what all the fuss was about.

Say what you will about 2-dimensional characters or stilted writing or whatever - it hooked me in right from the start. It's a thriller about the Holy Grail, and the lengths some people will go to either keep its secrets quiet or shout it from the rooftops.

Some Observations

In my view, the purpose of the characters is second to the puzzle: what the heck was the dead guy trying to tell Langdon? And, alternately, to the French cryptographer, Sophie Neveu? I had some interest in Neveu's background and felt sad for her at times, but if you're looking for a character study, you're reading the wrong book.

The beginning hooked me because it starts out with action: The almost-dead guy trying to deal with the guy with the gun. Okay, maybe it's farfetched to expect the Louvre guy to write out his scree on the Louvre floor and position his body in a certain way. Supposedly, his death was slow going.

Implausible? Could be, dahling. But Mr. Brown makes it sound like it could happen. It's the believability factor. Writing fantasy, that's a major concern. Am I going to pull this off so that people actually believe demons/goddesses/whatever walk the Earth? Or whatever else is fantastic in my story? Again, say what you will about word choice or stilted this or that, Mr. Brown made it believable in my mind.

The pace of this story made me almost breathless at times. Langdon and Neveu (and others) move around an awful lot - in only a few hours' time! This doesn't take place in a week or three days; this takes place late at night, into the early morning hours, finishing up (the major part of the story, anyway) later that day. One day, at most. This, I felt, kept the story well focused; there were lags, but there weren't many.

The epilogue made total sense, especially keeping in mind what a certain woman told Langdon in the very last chapter. It actually ends on a fairly quiet note, which I hadn't expected (most of the stuff I didn't figure out; I was blindsided by who the Teacher turned out to be). But it made total sense.

I was thinking: Yeah, that's what I want in my stories. The ending might be violent or quiet, but it should make sense to the story at hand. Throw in a twist or two along the way, and it makes for a good read.

So, What Did I Get Out of It?

Good question, grasshopper.

If nothing else, I read an example of what makes a bestseller: An interesting beginning, suspense, a fast pace, and an intriguing puzzle to keep people guessing. This won't necessarily work for every story (and who can pick out the next bestseller, anyway?), but the ingredients sure added up in this one.

Besides a couple of days of turning the pages and wondering what would happen next (some I guessed, some came from out of nowhere), this was a sorta learning experience for me. Would I have written it this way? Probably not. But I might just further analyze certain parts of it to see what hooked me in to begin with and what kept me turning the pages.

We should all be so fortunate to have a page turner, eh?

~Nancy Beck

The da Vinci Code - A Review

Anchor, 496 pages

Yeah, I finally got around to reading this, finishing it this morning. I generally stay away from hyped books because I figure the hype is over the top. If I do decide to read a bestseller, I usually wait months or years to see what all the fuss was about.

Say what you will about 2-dimensional characters or stilted writing or whatever - it hooked me in right from the start. It's a thriller about the Holy Grail, and the lengths some people will go to either keep its secrets quiet or shout it from the rooftops.

Some Observations

In my view, the purpose of the characters is second to the puzzle: what the heck was the dead guy trying to tell Langdon? And, alternately, to the French cryptographer, Sophie Neveu? I had some interest in Neveu's background and felt sad for her at times, but if you're looking for a character study, you're reading the wrong book.

The beginning hooked me because it starts out with action: The almost-dead guy trying to deal with the guy with the gun. Okay, maybe it's farfetched to expect the Louvre guy to write out his scree on the Louvre floor and position his body in a certain way. Supposedly, his death was slow going.

Implausible? Could be, dahling. But Mr. Brown makes it sound like it could happen. It's the believability factor. Writing fantasy, that's a major concern. Am I going to pull this off so that people actually believe demons/goddesses/whatever walk the Earth? Or whatever else is fantastic in my story? Again, say what you will about word choice or stilted this or that, Mr. Brown made it believable in my mind.

The pace of this story made me almost breathless at times. Langdon and Neveu (and others) move around an awful lot - in only a few hours' time! This doesn't take place in a week or three days; this takes place late at night, into the early morning hours, finishing up (the major part of the story, anyway) later that day. One day, at most. This, I felt, kept the story well focused; there were lags, but there weren't many.

The epilogue made total sense, especially keeping in mind what a certain woman told Langdon in the very last chapter. It actually ends on a fairly quiet note, which I hadn't expected (most of the stuff I didn't figure out; I was blindsided by who the Teacher turned out to be). But it made total sense.

I was thinking: Yeah, that's what I want in my stories. The ending might be violent or quiet, but it should make sense to the story at hand. Throw in a twist or two along the way, and it makes for a good read.

So, What Did I Get Out of It?

Good question, grasshopper.

If nothing else, I read an example of what makes a bestseller: An interesting beginning, suspense, a fast pace, and an intriguing puzzle to keep people guessing. This won't necessarily work for every story (and who can pick out the next bestseller, anyway?), but the ingredients sure added up in this one.

Besides a couple of days of turning the pages and wondering what would happen next (some I guessed, some came from out of nowhere), this was a sorta learning experience for me. Would I have written it this way? Probably not. But I might just further analyze certain parts of it to see what hooked me in to begin with and what kept me turning the pages.

We should all be so fortunate to have a page turner, eh?

~Nancy Beck