Luke Tarzian

"Someday, somehow, in another time perhaps, this will all make sense."

I feel like this particular sentence in one of the final chapters really resonated the entire feel of this book. Now, it is obvious from the huge amassing of 5 stars that most people considered it to be fabulous.

Unfortunately, while I opened this book with an open mind without having read beforehand the reviews or plot, I don't read grimdark all that much and it can be a whole deal lot harder to enjoy a book that is well, very grim and depressing.

To a degree, I don't mind stories taking place within depressing societies; I loved Orwell's 1984 for example. But there is a specific reason why I had a bit of a hard time enjoying this specific book:

The world is facing a huge threat of human villages being slaughtered by armies of monstrous corpses called lokyn that harvest the bodies of their victims and only increase their ranks. The war is against the offshoot of a demon called Te Mirkvahíl for apparently the past 500 years. Just that things have quieted down somewhat because general Searyn An managed to partially kill him in a raid around 10 years ago. But the attacks keep on coming and it is up to the perpetually depressive and mentally tormented Theailys An to decide to embark on a journey to the lands of the exiled and diseased immortals called Phantaxians for a material he needs to create a weapon called the Keeper's Wrath that might finish this demon once and for all.

Now, one huge issue I found with this plot is not the dangerous mission to reunite the pieces or the second principal POV story about the bastard Phantaxian princess Serece who killed one of her sisters by accident when she loses control of her beast familiar during a lokyn attack. That part of the book makes a whole deal of sense. It's more... the whole story in itself that goes beyond this. One could argue the writing is quite brilliant in the sense that Luke threads a complex multilayered story of tragic events seemingly repeating themselves, and I have to agree that if you enjoy mysteries and guessing what will happen next, this book will be a thrill to read.

The problem I personally found is that along with the fact I had a hugely hard time connecting with the characters and caring about them during their endless tormenting journey, things start to get increasingly complicated when demigods responsible for creating and destroying worlds are introduced in the story. Worse, threads of plot about side characters wishing to rescue a disgraced god from imprisonment (which might have had a huge importance in the plot later on), only for that thread of story to be forgotten entirely for no apparent reason. Furthermore, I never really understood what a dissident is. Theailys in all respects looks entirely human with physical traits common in the people of his birth city, and he can use both the illumiscent magic called Illum, and apparently the barely legal and socially frowned upon demonic shadow magic called Mikúr. The book never really explains much about mikúr, why it exists, if dissidents have little demon horns or all look human, if wielding both illum and mikúr is commonplace or unique to Theailys and his sister Searyn, etc... Furthermore, while I did enjoy Theailys always having a hard time putting up with the devilish evil voice in his head nicknamed Faro tempting to fully possess him and create havoc, we meet endless characters secretly playing the roles of dozens of characters both unimportant.. and even less important but apparently the supplanted character is important... but not. Further confusing is when the book head hops the real bad guy talking to the other even worse bad guy while both characters play the mental thoughts of the disguised character. I found the book hard to really enjoy because I was confused half of the time.

I liked Fiel's character, and we never really got to understand her true role in the story. I would have wanted the book to focus a bit more on the grief of the characters from their losses: Leyandra's fall from grace because demons stole her magic leaving her as a scarred pariah on forced semi-retirement, Serece for a brief moment is feeling bad for killing her sister, but 95% of the time feels depressed because the world is depressing. It is like she either suppressed the bad memories, doesn't really care about what she did (as in she cared more the fallout from her people than losing her sister). Having lost someone very close to me, I can still remember what it felt like resting on a bed every night and knowing that person was gone, which gave me a feeling of dread and a void within. Theailys and Calidan conveyed their loss very well, but I found Serece's experience to be far more superficial. But since we don't get a lot of backstory on proper Phantaxian society outside of Serece and her eccentric aunt Fiel, perhaps everyone behaves like a Vulcan and they don't show emotions like humans do.

All in all, while I found this book to be a bit hard to read because it confused me perhaps a tad bit too much, a lot of people will surely find it to be enjoying.

Oh, I decided to present this list of typos so that they can be fixed:
Page 18: sad smiled
79: would could
103: had heads were hands
130: genetic? (This isn't a typo per se, but why would a primitive medieval society know what this word means?)
139: capitol offense
211: smiled faded
211: daresay
249: approached (no period at end of sentence)
311: you must run (no period at end of sentence)… (más)

I was surprised by how quickly I read this mini novella. How long did it take me, 40 minutes perhaps?

Lest to say, the author promises a story that begins whimsical and quickly morphs into a story about personal tragedy and loss. It is quite difficult to explain how I felt about this story with words, but indifferent certainly would not. Whether you feel joyful or sorrow after reading this story, it will touch you and make you wish to call your loved ones to say hi.

Written as a sort of metaphor disguised as the story of Lucifer trying to do whatever he can to recover a treasured kettle, you will feel tempted to cheer for everyone and appreciate the beautiful prose as you are gently dragged along the inner pits of hell.

Beautiful story, Luke!… (más)

This review is also featured on Behind the Pages: The World Maker Parable

Locked away for the good of Jermoon, the chaotic Vulture has been freed. Rhona has no choice but to lead her lover Djen to the Hang-Dead forest and put her to death for aiding the Vulture. But along the way she questions her decision, surely there must be another way? Similarly, Varesh has walked the same path as Rhona. Each carries the burden of guilt. Stories of the Vulture speak of the chaos wrought, but what is truth, and what is a lie?

The World Maker Parable is a complex story, wrought with raw emotion. Readers will follow multiple characters through stories of overwhelming guilt and their ambitions to make a better world. Each is so focused on their ideas, but ultimately the decisions they make plague them as they see the results of their actions. The writing style is crafted in such a way that it draws the reader into each story, even though the barest of details are given to the characters. And the internal battle of the mind is brought to life in startling clarity.

Luke Tarzian personified trauma, making it a shadow person to live within and at times stand by the characters. As they struggled to redefine their truths and bury the memories of wrongdoing, the shadow would pull memories forward. Characters were forced to relive their dark paths to confront the atrocities they committed. Telling the story in such a way allowed readers to journey through different times and view the making or at times unmaking, of the world.

This is one of those books that lay out the pieces of a puzzle, stringing the reader along until the very end to snap them all in place. While I do wish there had been a bit more build-up to allow the reader some hint of the truth, the sudden realization is satisfying and will urge readers to jump back into the story from the beginning. With new eyes, the story carries an entirely different feeling.

The World Maker Parable will immerse readers in a darkly creative and challenging world. I recommend this to readers who enjoy thought provoking dark fantasy books. I am intrigued to see where how future novels evolve this world.… (más)

DNF @42%

Book source ~ Tour

The land of Ariath is suffering a plague. There are many characters trying to stop it. There’s a magical sword called The Keepers’ Wrath that’s supposed to be reforged so Ariath can go back to being normal. That’s it. That’s all I got.

There are so many characters in this and they have similar names. There are many places and they also have similar names. I have no idea how this plague started or even what kind it is. I’ve tried to work my way through this but at 42% I’m still so confused. I know that epic fantasy usually does this to me. It takes me a bit to get all the names down and where the story is headed. This is a “fault” that lies solely with me. However, it doesn’t usually take me this long to have the AHAH moment and it all coalesces into a huge vibrant picture and I gallop off into the proverbial sunset with the characters. Besides the reasons I’ve already listed, I think it’s because the scenes seem a bit disjointed. There’s not really a smooth transition from one character to the next and each scene is just them running around without any real meat to why they are doing so. I know that my fellow tour bloggers have enjoyed the book, so my review is in the minority. That’s not to say it’s not a great book for other readers. I just couldn’t get into it. Even though I DNF'd I'm giving it a 2 for the creativity.… (más)