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Teramar: The Gathering Night
A spoiled dictator’s son finds himself at the bitter end of a bloody coup. While hunting deep in the great Teramarian forests, Prince Hadrian and his teacher, the weapons master Archibald Cox, become the hunted themselves and are forced to flee their sacred home world. Worse, there is a growing suspicion that the prince’s mother and treacherous family appear to be driving this rebellion. Following three months in a starship’s hyber-bed, the young prince looks down upon a blue green world called earth. Now banished and forced into hiding, he dashes to the planet’s surface to blend with the local population. Simultaneously, Hadrian’s younger sister, the Princess Alian, remains on Teramar where she must confront their double-dealing mother. This tale is a sprawling, inter-galactic adventure that is certainly not for the faint-hearted. Learn the grim decisions each sibling must face in the grand arena called Teramar. 2016 Dante Rossetti Award, Finalist; 2012 Aeon Award; Short Listed.
419 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 1, 2014
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 13, 2015
This SF novel may interest at first because of a well thought-of basic idea.
It does not hold up to its promise, though, and the reason might be well explained through a small example.
When the lead approaches Earth, he is shown the Super Bowl: an event the omniscent narrator declares to be watched by the whole world.
The lead can follow the event because he was taught the "most important Earth's language", that language being English, of course.
- Now, I can assure the author that hardly anybody cares about the Super Bowl (or American Football) outside of the US; People outside the US who actually watch it only do that because they enjoy the musical intermission the narrator so much despises. -
This approach is not the ever valid "writing about the things one knows"; it is not only unsufferably ethnocentric (the US are a world power, not the whole world) but also incredibly naive.
This is just a small example: this naiveté permeates writing, fluid but peppered with mistakes, plotting and characterization and the end result is below publishing standard even for an indie.
The ending is also dissatisfying and has the only advantage of not leaving too many loose threads in what supposedly is the first instalment in a series.
It does not hold up to its promise, though, and the reason might be well explained through a small example.
When the lead approaches Earth, he is shown the Super Bowl: an event the omniscent narrator declares to be watched by the whole world.
The lead can follow the event because he was taught the "most important Earth's language", that language being English, of course.
- Now, I can assure the author that hardly anybody cares about the Super Bowl (or American Football) outside of the US; People outside the US who actually watch it only do that because they enjoy the musical intermission the narrator so much despises. -
This approach is not the ever valid "writing about the things one knows"; it is not only unsufferably ethnocentric (the US are a world power, not the whole world) but also incredibly naive.
This is just a small example: this naiveté permeates writing, fluid but peppered with mistakes, plotting and characterization and the end result is below publishing standard even for an indie.
The ending is also dissatisfying and has the only advantage of not leaving too many loose threads in what supposedly is the first instalment in a series.
Displaying 1 of 1 review