Tuesday 6 September 2011

FANTASY REVIEW: Nightbound Land 1: Roil - Trent Jamieson

Release Date: 01/09/11

SYNOPSIS:

Shale is in trouble - the creature-filled darkness known as the Roil is expanding, consuming the land, swallowing cities whole. Where once there were 12 metropolises, now only 4 remain. It's up to a drug addict, an old man and a woman bent on revenge to try to save their city - and the world.


REVIEW:

To be honest with you I had a hard time getting into this title. Yes I liked the concept, yes I liked the cover (OK at times I can be lulled by pretty things) and the fact that it was the first of a new series also grabbed me. That said however the few chapters took quite a while to get into and I think many readers would have given up after that, but because I knew Trent from his Steven De Selby series I persevered with this book and found that it soon righted itself after getting some clunky building out of the way.

Overall the book definitely improves and I feel that subsequent releases will benefit from the clunkier section at the beginning purely as a lot of the world building is out of the way. The characters grow and as such generate that caring ability as their misfit ways are forced to come together for the greater good which makes this a title about what the few can do to benefit the many. Finally add to this a pace that starts slow and picks up to full throttle blended with a combination of solid prose and rounded characterisation and it was a title that I had a lot of fun with. Just be prepared to slog through a bit to get to the good stuff.


2 comments:

ediFanoB said...

Another helpful review!

Roil is on my TBR pile and normally I give a book 50 pages to convince me to continue reading.

Fortunately I read your review and therefore I know I have to read more pages to in order to get into the book.

Angela Addams said...

This looks cool...I don't have a great track record for sticking with novels that are slow to get going but I'm willing to give it a try.