Started: 02/08/20
Finsihed: 22/08/20
Spoilers: No
I've been on a big Asian-inspired fantasy bender lately, so when I discovered this book, it sounded right my cup of tea.
I also believe it's important to support the self-pub community and not just trad-pubs. Self-pubs are authors too and deserve recognition for their hard work.
Writing and revising a book is difficult enough, let alone being in charge of editing, formatting, cover design, marketing, pulication, and the plethora of countless other hats self-pubbed authors have to wear to make a book happen. So I commend thee, sir.
Characters
I love an ensemble cast. That whole found-family trope is just so god damn wholesome when characters actually start acting like a family.
The characters were the strongest part of this book for me. It was difficult not fall in love with all their quirky little ways.
Cho and Zhihao Cheng were my favourite. But then I also enjoyed Roi the leper. But also the banter between Zhihao and Iron Gut Chen.
Just a lovable bunch of rouges in general. It's hard to pick one over another.
Plot
A garden varity adventure arc, but what makes this arc so much more interesting is the cast of characters and the world they must traverse.
A similar arc example is Kings of the Wyld, and I'd recommend this book to fans. In fact they are more similar than one my initially realise.
A charcter approaches the MC and says they have a job that needs doing. MC tags along and on the way they pick up a bunch more colourful characters to join the group as they travel across the country to reach there destination where their ultimate goal waits.
If you enjoy that sort of thing, you'll enjoy this.
Setting
I'm crazy right now about anything Asian.
(My rewatch of Kingdom on Netflix. My current obsession with The Untamed. Hours long sessions playing Ghost of Tsushima. And now any fantasy book I can find that features even the remotest flavours of Asian culture.) I'm devouring this stuff right now, and my apitite only grows stronger.
The world in this book feels like a blend of cultures, cause even though the setting is very much Japanese inspired, the charcter names are distinctly Chinese.
This Asian-inspired world Rob J Hayes has created somewhat feeds my hunger. And I say somewhat, because, yes, this is without a doubt an Asian-inspired world and the culture and mythology is noticeable... I just wanted a bit more.
When the charcters were venturing, I could see them clearly, but there were times when the world around them was a fog in my mind. I couldn't always see the world they were travelling through, which, at times, made the world feel a little sparse to me. If I can't clearly picture a surrounding in a book, my default is to insert fog, almost as a way to explain away why I can seeing anything past a certain point. And, unfortunately, through certain chapters, I had to insert a lot of fog.
But I didn't have to do this for many chapters, and the only reason I bring this up as an issue is cause I'm a stickler for world-building details. Sometimes it's the tiniest details that make the biggest difference.
Writing Style
Not my favourite style of prose, but this is an incredibly subjective matter, more so than any of the above categories.
There were a few minor technical things that I didn't quite vibe with, for instance, felt, decided, appeared. These are all filter words. They put a distance between narrator and reader and are generally viewed as Telling instead of Showing.
And though at first I found the formatting distracting, it didn't spoil my enjoyment of the story. The story is what counts most after all, not the way it looks on the page.
However, I think the book could've perhaps done with another round of editing. I know mistakes slip the net in many books, and I'm very forgiving about it. Mistakes happen, we're all human, however there were quite a few going on in some chapters that it started to distract from the narrative itself.
My final point, on a stylistic level, there's a questionable font choice going on at the start of each chapter. Using a more Asian-looking font is cool, but it has some readability issues and I struggled at times.
Final Impression
This book is definitely worth a read if you enjoy Asian-inspired fantasy, adventure arcs, ensemble casts, and quick reads.
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