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Chronicles of Ara #1
Creation
When J.R.R. Tolkien is summoned to authenticate a recently-discovered "lost" book of Beowulf, events are set in motion that years later will unveil an imminent tragedy: The entirety of the world's art and invention has been inspired by a corrupted muse, who has implanted a series of codes within the works of history's most influential authors, warning of humanity's end and a new dawn of time
- GenresFantasy
462 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 6, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
March 5, 2016
Full review here: https://bookidote.wordpress.com/2016/...
(3.5) This book is difficult to rate and difficult to describe too. Briefly, the author tells the story of the collapsing world of fantasy and Creation. Ara, a cursed goddess, also a character of a character's novel Mirkwood. Yes one of the characters is a writer and Ara is in part of the story but she is more than that. Ara, being the Muse Goddess can influence other's inspiration and act of creation. When a dragonslayer is killed in one of the book, revenge will get the best of her and turn her goodness into a dark fate. The writing is impeccable. You will find everything in this book : from philosophy and litterature to a math equation that can maybe quantify Creation. The author seemed to go over a thorough search in the Fantasy litterature mentioning some facts about JRR Tolkien's life and work (BRAVO to these authors I love it when I see authors do their research :). JRR Tolkien is actually one of the main characters in the book. #INCEPTION.
May 4, 2015
CREATION: The Chronicles of Ara is the first of an 8 book series which falls in the Scifi genre but will especially appeal to readers of speculative and dystopia fiction. Combining philosophy, literature, science, and the talents of writers turned characters J.R.R. Tolkien and Lewis Carroll the story of a corrupted Muse winds into the lives of everyday humans who struggle to save their lives and their world when a lost manuscript of Beowulf points to a truth the characters struggle to comprehend. If all the universe’s creative works were spent into an equation of sacred geometry and those works continue to create the world what might become of us if there is a mistake in the math. Artists spend a lifetime wondering where that spark of creativity originates. Some say the divine, others the miracle of the mind. Our ancestors might have credited the Muse. In the end, we are just grateful for it. I’m looking forward to Book 2 to see where how this story grows. Great job, Joel Eisenberg and Stephen Hillard!
June 10, 2015
I met one of the two authors at BEA and read this book first. The Chronicles of Ara is very different and for sheer originality this one will be hard to beat this year. If a muse who inspires creation turns dark, what is the ultimate meaning of our art? In my gut, I believe the series may be tough to sustain over eight books, especially based on the ending of this one, but I hope I'm wrong. This is a very special first effort that may break out. Part fantasy, part science fiction but mainly literary fiction to my eyes, I have to give credit to the authors, Joel Eisenberg and Steve Hillard, for having the guts to take some big chances. Not your typical novel for sure.
July 24, 2015
I got this book at #BEA15 and I must say it is one of the greatest books I have read so far. The mix of mystery, spirituality, philosophy, literature, science and much more put into the first part of The Chronicles. The book introduces us to many characters and their stories, and often the reader will stop and wonder about the philosophical questions that pop through the book. Is really nothing what it seems it is? Does Muse really exist? Did she ever exist? Are dragons coming back?
Imaginative, provoking, masterwork. If you love Tolkien, you will love this novel. But I think I can safely assume anyone who likes challenge will love this book.
I can't wait for the next part!
Imaginative, provoking, masterwork. If you love Tolkien, you will love this novel. But I think I can safely assume anyone who likes challenge will love this book.
I can't wait for the next part!
April 2, 2016
Wow....intriguing very interesting read Thomas was cool. This was a very intriguing book. Liked it very much. Also loved the fact it was consistent, wasn't all over the place like some fantasy books can get......wow I'm just really sitting here thinking about this book and how well written it was....so many a scenes in keep thinking about, but I won't give anything away......what a awesome series this is going to be.
March 24, 2016
Let me start off by saying wow. This book had me going for it. Very creative,Imaginative, Surprising, Thought-provoking, mind blowing. Loved how it combined philosophy, literature, and science. Interesting to say the least. A must read. I enjoyed reading this book very much.
August 9, 2015
The Chronicles of Ara is an eight-volume epic fantasy written by Joel Eisenberg and Steven Hillard. The Chronicles of Ara: Creation contains the first two books of the series, and it is a companion piece to Hillard’s Mirkwood, A Novel About J.R.R. Tolkien, which Hillard had to go to court in a battle against the estate of J.R.R. in order to have published. It deals with facts and events in Tolkien’s life, in a fictionalized form.
Ara was a character in Mirkwood, and she is greatly expanded upon in The Chronicles of Ara. The Chronicles of Ara: Creation also has Tolkien as one of its major characters, along with many others, like Lewis Carroll and Alice Liddell, who Carroll was inspired by when he wrote Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass, in Book Two.
The first two books of The Chronicles of Ara, compiled in The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, are a page-turning, mind-expanding journey into the realms of the imagination and deep questions like what is it that inspires art and authors. For instance, one of the things that inspired the young J.R.R. Tolkien were tales he was told by his mother about there being dragons in a nearby forest.
The concept of the goddess, Ara, was inspired in the mind of author Hillard by a question that one of his daughters had about Tolkien’s books, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. She asked her father why there were not any heroic female characters in Tolkien’s novels. At the time, Hillard, thinking on his feet, said to her that “Professor Tolkien just didn’t get around to them yet.”
Though neither of Hillard’s daughters seemed like they bought his explanation, he writes that they asked him to tell them a story about Ara. He did just that, calling her “a halfling lass, a hobbitess if you will.”
A bit later, Hillard writes: “She would change the world by the most powerful of tools: inspiration.” He wrote about Ara in Mirkwood, then decided to expand upon the character with co-author, Eisenberg.
In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, Ara is a very powerful goddess, who can take human form. She has been lied to by all of the other gods and goddesses, and she does not, at first, realize her true power and potential.
One way that she is different from her sisters is that, unlike them, she is “cursed.’ She will become mortal, the co-authors write, “over the course of eons. For her sisters, “time and space are one,” but for Ara, she has to endlessly wait, because she can only see to the Infinity Pass.” What, exactly, the Infinity Pass is, will not be explained until later in the book.
With Mirkwood, Hillard wrote about a time of dragons and dragon wars, before humans walked the Earth. In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, times and setting shift, from the era of Tolkien’s boyhood to years after he has passed away, the time when author, Thomas McFee, has the idea of writing about Tolkien but in a fictionalized manner. The authors write that “McFee lauded Tolkien, but he did not believe him to be beyond reproach.”
McFee even names his daughter, Samantha, after one of Tolkien’s most beloved characters, Sam Gamgee. After his daughter has grown up, McFee does not particularly like it that she has fallen in love with an Iraq war veteran, Daniel Baxter, as he wants to still protect her and be the main influence in her life.
In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, back in Tolkien’s era, when he has retired, he is asked about the genuineness and validity of a supposedly “lost” book that has been one of the greatest influences on his writing, namely Beowulf. This seemingly innocuous validation by Tolkien leads to a violent backlash. Many of history’s most important and influential works and authors, it is discovered, have contained warnings about the goddess and muse, Ara. Her intention is to bring about a return to “dragon-scorched earth,” a time chronicled as “The Pre-Genesis Era.”
The goddess/muse, Ara, has secretly served as the inspiration for mankind’s greatest works of literature. Some would call Ara a “corrupted muse.” Eisenberg and Hillard write about her influence over the eras in their epic fantasy, The Chronicles of Ara: Creation. While Ara has inspired countless works of literature and art, it seems that one of her main aims has little to do with humanity, as it is to bring about the return of the age of dragons, a return to a time when they ruled supreme, like in Mirkwood. For fans of fantasy on a grand and epic scale, The Chronicles of Ara: Creation is a Must Read.
Ara was a character in Mirkwood, and she is greatly expanded upon in The Chronicles of Ara. The Chronicles of Ara: Creation also has Tolkien as one of its major characters, along with many others, like Lewis Carroll and Alice Liddell, who Carroll was inspired by when he wrote Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass, in Book Two.
The first two books of The Chronicles of Ara, compiled in The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, are a page-turning, mind-expanding journey into the realms of the imagination and deep questions like what is it that inspires art and authors. For instance, one of the things that inspired the young J.R.R. Tolkien were tales he was told by his mother about there being dragons in a nearby forest.
The concept of the goddess, Ara, was inspired in the mind of author Hillard by a question that one of his daughters had about Tolkien’s books, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. She asked her father why there were not any heroic female characters in Tolkien’s novels. At the time, Hillard, thinking on his feet, said to her that “Professor Tolkien just didn’t get around to them yet.”
Though neither of Hillard’s daughters seemed like they bought his explanation, he writes that they asked him to tell them a story about Ara. He did just that, calling her “a halfling lass, a hobbitess if you will.”
A bit later, Hillard writes: “She would change the world by the most powerful of tools: inspiration.” He wrote about Ara in Mirkwood, then decided to expand upon the character with co-author, Eisenberg.
In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, Ara is a very powerful goddess, who can take human form. She has been lied to by all of the other gods and goddesses, and she does not, at first, realize her true power and potential.
One way that she is different from her sisters is that, unlike them, she is “cursed.’ She will become mortal, the co-authors write, “over the course of eons. For her sisters, “time and space are one,” but for Ara, she has to endlessly wait, because she can only see to the Infinity Pass.” What, exactly, the Infinity Pass is, will not be explained until later in the book.
With Mirkwood, Hillard wrote about a time of dragons and dragon wars, before humans walked the Earth. In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, times and setting shift, from the era of Tolkien’s boyhood to years after he has passed away, the time when author, Thomas McFee, has the idea of writing about Tolkien but in a fictionalized manner. The authors write that “McFee lauded Tolkien, but he did not believe him to be beyond reproach.”
McFee even names his daughter, Samantha, after one of Tolkien’s most beloved characters, Sam Gamgee. After his daughter has grown up, McFee does not particularly like it that she has fallen in love with an Iraq war veteran, Daniel Baxter, as he wants to still protect her and be the main influence in her life.
In The Chronicles of Ara: Creation, back in Tolkien’s era, when he has retired, he is asked about the genuineness and validity of a supposedly “lost” book that has been one of the greatest influences on his writing, namely Beowulf. This seemingly innocuous validation by Tolkien leads to a violent backlash. Many of history’s most important and influential works and authors, it is discovered, have contained warnings about the goddess and muse, Ara. Her intention is to bring about a return to “dragon-scorched earth,” a time chronicled as “The Pre-Genesis Era.”
The goddess/muse, Ara, has secretly served as the inspiration for mankind’s greatest works of literature. Some would call Ara a “corrupted muse.” Eisenberg and Hillard write about her influence over the eras in their epic fantasy, The Chronicles of Ara: Creation. While Ara has inspired countless works of literature and art, it seems that one of her main aims has little to do with humanity, as it is to bring about the return of the age of dragons, a return to a time when they ruled supreme, like in Mirkwood. For fans of fantasy on a grand and epic scale, The Chronicles of Ara: Creation is a Must Read.
April 5, 2016
A muse suffers the loss of a mortal dragonslayer she's loved between realms, and the authors she inspires (Tolkien, Mary Shelley, Louis Carroll etc.) create works that resonate because underneath the words lie hidden histories we are only just discovering. These hidden histories also provide the clues that will one day lead man to his own self-destruction, and that day is now. We relate to the inadvertent archetypes the classic writers have sourced and created (in real time), and their stories last for ages because of it. These are ambitious ideas to explore, as are the first two books in Eisenberg and Hillard's "The Chronicles of Ara" series. If you read reviews here and on amazon, you'll see that these new books are resonating with some readers as well as something "different." Eisenberg and Hillard have created a bold new world here; one senses this is an all-in or all-out deal, I think for these writers and maybe as well for the readers. These are books of ideas, well-written and relevant. They're also very smart so be prepared. Balls to the wall for sure.
October 8, 2015
This is my first review on Goodreads, for this book that I never heard of a couple of weeks ago but was pretty strongly recommended. Now I know why. I think Creation is magnificent and, like the movie 2001, people are going to love or hate it. It's different, that's for sure. Art is the villain here. A dragonslayer is unexpectedly killed and the muse who loves him infects the artistic universe in an act of vengeance. This becomes the lead-in to the end of the world. What I liked most about this is its so different than anything I've read before. Tolkien himself is a character, and Lewis Carroll. It seems like Ara, the muse, manipulated the world of creation to allow us to destroy ourselves. Art inspires man and the world, and our art is evil. It's a fast read - you may need a decent IQ to get though some of it - but what a rewarding book. Fantastic work and the best I've read this year by a big margin.
January 29, 2015
I didn't particularly like this book. It was... just too odd. I wish I could follow it better, but I just couldn't. I think there was more hype to it than was actually translated properly to the page. It seemed scatterbrained at best and then really interesting but unfocused at others.
It took me a really REALLY long time to finish this book, not because it was a difficult or long read, but because I just had NO interest in it - and that's saying something from me. This book should have been a fantastic read, and instead turned out to be full of hot air.
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1/29/2015 Update & note of point: The Netgalley ARC I read this novel from was an uncorrected proof. I can only hope and pray that the published version is 1000 times better.
It took me a really REALLY long time to finish this book, not because it was a difficult or long read, but because I just had NO interest in it - and that's saying something from me. This book should have been a fantastic read, and instead turned out to be full of hot air.
--------------------
1/29/2015 Update & note of point: The Netgalley ARC I read this novel from was an uncorrected proof. I can only hope and pray that the published version is 1000 times better.
January 5, 2015
I was hesitant with this book at first. It's received its share of hype (the authors' social media is ridiculous, as in very high for a new series) and I saw an early copy from Net Galley, which had some formatting issues, since fixed. I received a second advance of the corrected version. I'm more a reader than a reviewer, and all I can say here is this book is a real literary find, much different I think than most books you will read and certainly not what I expected. J.R.R. Tolkien discovers a long-lost section of "Beowulf" and the book spins off into some pretty amazing directions from there, featuring a corrupted muse, an enslaved dragon, Lewis Carroll and more. This may not be to everyone's liking (or it may). I found "Creation" astounding on numerous levels, and am looking forward to seeing where the series goes from here. An easy 5 stars for originality and ambition from me.
March 2, 2017
The book tells the story about a muse goddess called Ara. Ara worked with the great writers of history and helped them increase and guide their art. In modern days, Ara has become mortal and the main characters must work with her.
This book took a long time to read - the writing itself was OK, but there was lots of jumping around and very short sections. Barely one idea got across, when the book jumps from modern day to 200 years ago... and then back in 1 page. It made for a confusing read. Plus the book tended to be light on critical events - there was a concept of Abeyance, which jumped the story 9 months, but no writing about what occurred or anything. Overall it was really distracting and made for a hard read.
*I got this book through GoodRead's Giveaways - an excellent source of interesting books!
This book took a long time to read - the writing itself was OK, but there was lots of jumping around and very short sections. Barely one idea got across, when the book jumps from modern day to 200 years ago... and then back in 1 page. It made for a confusing read. Plus the book tended to be light on critical events - there was a concept of Abeyance, which jumped the story 9 months, but no writing about what occurred or anything. Overall it was really distracting and made for a hard read.
*I got this book through GoodRead's Giveaways - an excellent source of interesting books!
August 12, 2016
* I won this book in a goodreads giveaway - no review required*
This is my first review on goodreads.
Creation (Chronicles of Ara #1) is about a muse who suffers great loss and the authors we all know and love whose work consists of hints to her exsistence.
Creation was a difficult book to get through - there is a lot of jumping back and forth with time and places. It took me a long time to get through (which is rare for me) due to the scattered storyline. After finishing, I realized that I liked the plot, but it would honestly be better on fim then on the pages. I cannot imagine myself reading all eight books.
This is my first review on goodreads.
Creation (Chronicles of Ara #1) is about a muse who suffers great loss and the authors we all know and love whose work consists of hints to her exsistence.
Creation was a difficult book to get through - there is a lot of jumping back and forth with time and places. It took me a long time to get through (which is rare for me) due to the scattered storyline. After finishing, I realized that I liked the plot, but it would honestly be better on fim then on the pages. I cannot imagine myself reading all eight books.
June 6, 2015
I really thought I was going to love this book. In fact, it started out as something so perfectly designed for me, that I almost felt like I was and had always been under the influence of the muse of the tale. Then the book fragmented into a rather incoherent mishmash of gobbledeegook... And then it just ended, leaving me wondering what in the hell I'd just read. (Also, this book is in serious need of a copy editor.)
April 10, 2015
Creation is a creation indeed! It's the kind of book that you just can't put down and it's wonderfully written! I was very impressed considering I don't typically enjoy reading fantasy novels. I would recommend this book to anybody and everybody - it was absolutely thrilling!
February 25, 2016
i received this book through a give away here from goodreads i have to say its different from anything i have ever read a bit of fresh air well write an very enjoyable
January 30, 2016
* Received this book in exchange for my review *
The Chronicles of Ara: Creation takes you on a reading adventure!
The Chronicles of Ara: Creation takes you on a reading adventure!
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews