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Nightshade Unicorn #1
Forerunner
"That evil now comes near to overflowing its bounds.”
Allabva stood, staring at Hronomon. This was what he wanted to talk about? Was this real?
“What do you mean, overflow its bounds?” Allabva asked.
“Perhaps you saw the sky split open last night?” Hronomon said.
Allabva shared a look with Mother, then both nodded, faces pale.
“And a few months ago,” Mother said. “What does that have to do with this?”
“Those are cracks in the prison. More will come in the next months. We must prepare, be ready to stop it. When the evil bursts its prison, all the world will feel it.”
*****
Allabva is content with a quiet life, tending her mother’s orchard and nurturing a budding romance. Though legends of the Nightshade Unicorn, a frightful beast, echo in the shadows, Allabva pays them no heed. Unicorns—Nomord—are peaceful, lighthearted, and all female.
Until a male Nomord, the Forerunner, singles her out, summoning her on an urgent mission to aid the great Shrongelin—another being from legend—and save the world from an impossible, evil menace.
Now, she races against time and faces the realization that what she didn’t know can hurt her—and threaten the entire world.
*****
What readers are saying about
“Intriguing and compelling.” – Nancy M.
“A pleasure to read.” – Michael E.
“Engaging.” – Emily F.
“High-quality.” – Walter R.
Allabva stood, staring at Hronomon. This was what he wanted to talk about? Was this real?
“What do you mean, overflow its bounds?” Allabva asked.
“Perhaps you saw the sky split open last night?” Hronomon said.
Allabva shared a look with Mother, then both nodded, faces pale.
“And a few months ago,” Mother said. “What does that have to do with this?”
“Those are cracks in the prison. More will come in the next months. We must prepare, be ready to stop it. When the evil bursts its prison, all the world will feel it.”
*****
Allabva is content with a quiet life, tending her mother’s orchard and nurturing a budding romance. Though legends of the Nightshade Unicorn, a frightful beast, echo in the shadows, Allabva pays them no heed. Unicorns—Nomord—are peaceful, lighthearted, and all female.
Until a male Nomord, the Forerunner, singles her out, summoning her on an urgent mission to aid the great Shrongelin—another being from legend—and save the world from an impossible, evil menace.
Now, she races against time and faces the realization that what she didn’t know can hurt her—and threaten the entire world.
*****
What readers are saying about
“Intriguing and compelling.” – Nancy M.
“A pleasure to read.” – Michael E.
“Engaging.” – Emily F.
“High-quality.” – Walter R.
387 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 28, 2024
11 people are currently reading
94 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
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June 13, 2024If it's possible, I'm going to save this review without giving it a rating; I'll let other readers post ratings. ... That's because I'm the author. It was fun to write this book, and I'm currently working on the sequel!
I have big plans for this series, so be sure to follow through to the end; you won't be disappointed.
I have big plans for this series, so be sure to follow through to the end; you won't be disappointed.
October 29, 2024
The Nightshade Unicorn series promises to be a fantasy saga that readers will love. In Forerunner, author T.S. Pedramon creates a pretechnological world with family farms, horse and wagons and village blacksmiths. The unique feature are the unicorns. These eternal magical creatures seem silly and playful, but are known to bestow magic at times. They can heal the ill or encourage a great crop. Everyone knows that all the unicorns are female. Then a male unicorn approaches a young woman. He is the forerunner. The males are actually away from the world guarding a great evil who breaks out of her prison every few centuries. The forerunner needs to take a special human who is honest and kindhearted to magically bond with the leader. together, they will both have the mystical strength to fight the evil. This first book is the story of their adventure as they trek to meet with the Guardian in a predestined place. It contains magic, myth and adventure. I am hooked and I can't wait for the writer to complete the story.
August 9, 2024
The prologue is interesting in setting an unusual stage, one at sea. It describes a trader, Tylonus, who just wants to be heading home after embarking on a sea voyage to trade goods, hears a rather gory tale about a Nightshade Unicorn, a deadly beast, a beast that feeds on the flesh of those who venture into its territory. Which he naturally scoffs at, which he immediately discounts as fancy and dismisses it as the ramblings of a drunken sailor. I mean, he knows that Unicorns are benevolent creatures, they are healers, not destroyers but then he finds himself face to face with the exact creature he disbelieved existed. Very exciting and well paced prologue and I was looking forward to see what the unicorn wanted, what Tylonus would do but then the story took off in a different direction and to be honest, the first few chapters didn't live up to what the prologue alluded to, at least for me. It follows the exploits of a young girl on the brink of womanhood, and the first 25% of the book is dedicated to her daily life, which frankly is not a very exciting life...a glimmer of excitement was when the Unicorn or Nomord, as is their correct name, made contact with Allubva. Hronomon is the first male unicorn she's seen or knows about and when he declares that Allubva is needed to contain an evil, that's when the story really starts for me. The getting to know one another, Allubva learning about the Nomord, the friendship that started to develop.
This is not a fasted paced read, it's akin to one careful brick placed upon the next, building a solid wall, step by step. The world building was strong, perhaps a bit too strong at first but it definitely imprints Allubva's world firmly. For this, I applaud the author. The colours, the textures, the characters, all became picture perfect. And even though it's relevantly slow to gain momentum, by the time I was halfway through the book, I was fully committed. Likewise, although I was pretty ambivalent about Allubva at first, her character developed nicely, fuller, more meaty as the story progressed. This is one of those books that initially was "I'm not sure about this" for me, to "oh boy that was great" and I'm very glad I DID continue through, I'm very glad I DID get to see the development, I'm very glad I DID read this book.
This is not a fasted paced read, it's akin to one careful brick placed upon the next, building a solid wall, step by step. The world building was strong, perhaps a bit too strong at first but it definitely imprints Allubva's world firmly. For this, I applaud the author. The colours, the textures, the characters, all became picture perfect. And even though it's relevantly slow to gain momentum, by the time I was halfway through the book, I was fully committed. Likewise, although I was pretty ambivalent about Allubva at first, her character developed nicely, fuller, more meaty as the story progressed. This is one of those books that initially was "I'm not sure about this" for me, to "oh boy that was great" and I'm very glad I DID continue through, I'm very glad I DID get to see the development, I'm very glad I DID read this book.
March 11, 2025
What a great book for a first time author. I loved the story and character development. He introduced me to a whole new land of Unicorns and their magical powers. Bring on book 2 of this series.
March 13, 2024
I am so glad I was given an opportunity to read this book! It is a great adventure story with some thinly veiled discussions of theodicy and right vs wrong without really being preachy or judgmental. I loved the characters and the relationships in the story.
I will say I had a bit of a hard time with the first few chapters before she leaves on her journey. Partly just because I have a hard time with world introduction in a lot of fantasy and sci-fi books in general, but also some of the dialogue and poems just didn’t quite do it for me.
So if you’re like me and don’t really jive with the first few chapters, don’t stop reading. Pedramon has important truths to share and a great adventure to bring you on. You will cheer on Allabva as she races to do what needs to be done to save the world and you will mourn with her in her times of grief. You’ll mourn for the evil in the world and rejoice in the bravery and selflessness that is to be found in it.
I’m excited to read the rest of the series.
I will say I had a bit of a hard time with the first few chapters before she leaves on her journey. Partly just because I have a hard time with world introduction in a lot of fantasy and sci-fi books in general, but also some of the dialogue and poems just didn’t quite do it for me.
So if you’re like me and don’t really jive with the first few chapters, don’t stop reading. Pedramon has important truths to share and a great adventure to bring you on. You will cheer on Allabva as she races to do what needs to be done to save the world and you will mourn with her in her times of grief. You’ll mourn for the evil in the world and rejoice in the bravery and selflessness that is to be found in it.
I’m excited to read the rest of the series.
October 8, 2024
Note: I was provided a free copy by the author for review; however, I will do my best to provide an honest and unbiased review. Thank you to T. S. Pedramon for the opportunity to read and review this book!
I really enjoyed this one! It certainly has a few shortcomings, which I’ll discuss later, but overall a very enjoyable novel.
First things first, I think this was just a fun book to read. It’s a well-paced, enjoyable adventure that I had a good time with and always looked forward to continuing. As for more particulars, I found the setup quite compelling. You have the main character, Allavba, who is found by the Nomord (this series’ name for a unicorn) Hronomon and tasked with going on a quest to bond with the powerful Shrongelin in order to essentially save the world. It’s a tropey and fairly traditional fantasy setup, sure, but it’s done well and has enough variation to it from the usual that I found it interesting. I also appreciated that while the book is largely spent traveling from location to location, it never really felt boring or too much like a travel log; there was always some new thing going on around every corner that kept things interesting. One thing I also enjoyed was some of the character work, particularly early on in Allavba’s hometown, some of the people she meets along the way, and Hronomon. The dialogue between characters was also quite good, which I especially enjoyed in the opening chapters. The worldbuilding is well done—relatively minimal in terms of literal worldbuilding, but with plenty of backstory and lore that is explained to the reader over the course of the book. I enjoyed it quite a bit and thought it had some pretty interesting ideas, particularly the emphasis on unicorns. There were some fun twists and turns towards the end that I didn’t expect, but really enjoyed. Speaking of the ending, I loooved the ending!
As for more negative points, I think those largely land more on the writing side. The book is well written and feels good to read, for the most part; however, some of the dialogue and worldbuilding felt a little bit clunky to me. While I enjoyed the dialogue in many places, at times it felt a bit stiff. I also think the worldbuilding could get a little bit infodump-y at times. This wasn’t excessive by any means, but there were times where it felt like the book would stop to explain some part of the world or lore. This didn’t happen too frequently though, and for the most part I thought the worldbuilding was well integrated into dialogue.
Overall, a very solid and enjoyable first book in this series. While it has some small hiccups here and there in terms of the writing, I think the story being told and the world being created here are quite good. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for book two when it releases!
Rating: 8/10
I really enjoyed this one! It certainly has a few shortcomings, which I’ll discuss later, but overall a very enjoyable novel.
First things first, I think this was just a fun book to read. It’s a well-paced, enjoyable adventure that I had a good time with and always looked forward to continuing. As for more particulars, I found the setup quite compelling. You have the main character, Allavba, who is found by the Nomord (this series’ name for a unicorn) Hronomon and tasked with going on a quest to bond with the powerful Shrongelin in order to essentially save the world. It’s a tropey and fairly traditional fantasy setup, sure, but it’s done well and has enough variation to it from the usual that I found it interesting. I also appreciated that while the book is largely spent traveling from location to location, it never really felt boring or too much like a travel log; there was always some new thing going on around every corner that kept things interesting. One thing I also enjoyed was some of the character work, particularly early on in Allavba’s hometown, some of the people she meets along the way, and Hronomon. The dialogue between characters was also quite good, which I especially enjoyed in the opening chapters. The worldbuilding is well done—relatively minimal in terms of literal worldbuilding, but with plenty of backstory and lore that is explained to the reader over the course of the book. I enjoyed it quite a bit and thought it had some pretty interesting ideas, particularly the emphasis on unicorns. There were some fun twists and turns towards the end that I didn’t expect, but really enjoyed. Speaking of the ending, I loooved the ending!
As for more negative points, I think those largely land more on the writing side. The book is well written and feels good to read, for the most part; however, some of the dialogue and worldbuilding felt a little bit clunky to me. While I enjoyed the dialogue in many places, at times it felt a bit stiff. I also think the worldbuilding could get a little bit infodump-y at times. This wasn’t excessive by any means, but there were times where it felt like the book would stop to explain some part of the world or lore. This didn’t happen too frequently though, and for the most part I thought the worldbuilding was well integrated into dialogue.
Overall, a very solid and enjoyable first book in this series. While it has some small hiccups here and there in terms of the writing, I think the story being told and the world being created here are quite good. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for book two when it releases!
Rating: 8/10
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews