The Writing Factor: Yesterday I wrote about the cool stuff of Venom and Song. Today I want to talk about the writing.
First, I thought Wayne Thomas Batson and Christopher Hopper did a great job capturing the tone and language of their teenage characters. They also gave colorful descriptions of Allyra. From the caverns of Nightwash to Whitehall where the teenage elves trained, I felt like I could see everything.
And action. Lots and lots of action :). This is not a slow paced book. Between escaping warspiders, sliding down zip lines through the forest, training in the danger room and fighting a war, there was no time to sit and sip tea for these teenage elven lords (yes, that was a pun for anyone who finished the book lol).
Here is my one problem with the writing: there were so many characters I was trying to follow that I was never able to engage in the story. I think the story would have been stronger if it had been told from the point of view of one, two, or maybe three characters. Instead, I was constantly jumping around between the seven main characters along with a couple of the minor characters. There were too many heads for me to follow.
Like I said above, this book is filled with a lot of action. Action is good. You don’t want to hear the story of a well-written character that cleans the lint of his toes while he contemplates the universe. But action doesn’t mean a lot to me unless I care about the characters first and what happens to them. And because I was constantly jumping around between all the characters, I wasn’t able to connect with any of the characters. I was never given enough time with one character to build that connection.
That is the one thing I wish differently about the book. I believe the story would have been stronger told from just one of the teenagers. But that’s just my opinion :). Tune in tomorrow where I will take a look at the Spiritual Factor of Venom and Song.
*In conjunction with the CSFF Blog Tour, I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
