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The Ashen Court #1
Sentinel
Aelathil is on the brink of civil war! Once pampered and spoiled as the only heir to one of Aelathil’s most powerful lordlings, Callan’s world has been tipped upside down by King Ramsey and his mighty dragons. Now he must join the growing resistance or watch as everything his family stood for crumbles away to nothing.
After her father is mauled by one of the massive lion-men of the frozen north, Pyra must do her best to hold his seat as Lord until he recovers—all while teaching herself to control the magical spark smoldering inside her.
Together, Callan and Pyra will shape Aelathil’s future. For better or worse, they will stand Sentinel over the people that the King has targeted for destruction. Should they fail, Pyra’s people will be buried in the northern wastes and Callan’s family legacy will be turned to ash.
After her father is mauled by one of the massive lion-men of the frozen north, Pyra must do her best to hold his seat as Lord until he recovers—all while teaching herself to control the magical spark smoldering inside her.
Together, Callan and Pyra will shape Aelathil’s future. For better or worse, they will stand Sentinel over the people that the King has targeted for destruction. Should they fail, Pyra’s people will be buried in the northern wastes and Callan’s family legacy will be turned to ash.
- GenresFantasy
274 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 7, 2015
12 people are currently reading
110 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
December 17, 2015
Great story. It keeps you interested and pulled in. I bought the ebook version. The publisher /editor should have done a much better job of editing. Grammatical errors in most chapters. Looking forward to the sequel; without the errors.
August 24, 2017
I really enjoyed reading the first book of this series and am looking forward to the next one coming out!
December 28, 2016
“Aelathil is on the brink of civil war! Once pampered and spoiled as the only heir to one of Aelathil’s most powerful lordlings, Callan’s world has been tipped upside down by King Ramsey and his mighty dragons. Now he must join the growing resistance or watch as everything his family stood for crumbles away to nothing.
After her father is mauled by one of the massive lion-men of the frozen north, Pyra must do her best to hold his seat as Lord until he recovers—all while teaching herself to control the magical spark smoldering inside her.
Together, Callan and Pyra will shape Aelathil’s future. For better or worse, they will stand Sentinel over the people that the King has targeted for destruction. Should they fail, Pyra’s people will be buried in the northern wastes and Callan’s family legacy will be turned to ash.”
I’m not going to lie here when I say that I struggled a little getting through this book, I feel that it would have been a lot more enjoyable were I still in my teens. The plot is quite simple and trope heavy along with some of the characters and they way they were put together, they have small amounts of back story and managed to make me feel slightly attached to them. The main characters of the story had more time invested in them and as such were a little more fleshed out and interesting. The book has some great and interesting moments (Dragon breathing gas as another ignites it, races of large anthropomorphic cat and dog-like people and quite a few other moments which were brilliant) the issue is that they are few and far between the book just didn’t quite grip me as I’m sure the author intended it to. Now as a fantasy book as described it’s not half bad, enjoyable enough but it just didn’t grip me in the way some others have.
BUT we mustn’t forget that this is a debut so I’d like to suggest some creative criticism. Firstly let’s address the characters Callan and Pyra were strong points and both had some quite good development and time spent getting attached to them, Murdock and the paladin (Whose name sadly escapes me) had some nice moments and remained interesting. But the side characters often felt quite trope heavy, the old mercenary who trained Callan for example. I feel like you were aiming for quite traditional fantasy and that’s not a bad thing at all, look at D&D still going after all these years. Because it takes those tropes and gives them a fresh lick of paint and adds new monsters, worlds and so on.
We say in D&D (And I feel the same if true for writing) everything is cliche and has been done before. But that isn’t bad, sticking with a staple thing people love and have always loved and giving it a nice tweak is excellent (See earlier statement about the dragon combo, awesome!). I also feel the world would benefit from some more showing as opposed to telling, seeing characters interact with the world as they pass through it is great and it allows us to learn more about them based on those interactions. Chad all in all I think you have a very good foundation here it’s a good book, but to become a great one I think that moving away from or adding a new flourish to some of the tropes, showing as much as if not more than telling and focusing on making all of your characters interesting would greatly benefit a good book and make it brilliant.
So would I recommend this book? Yes, I think I would if you are looking for quite a simple easy read I’d also strongly recommend it as a young adult fantasy book because to me at least it felt that way. If you’re looking for either of those things you should definitely pick it up and I’d also suggest this to parents looking for entry-level fantasy for children. If you fit into those categories give it a look I feel you would get a lot more enjoyment out of it.
After her father is mauled by one of the massive lion-men of the frozen north, Pyra must do her best to hold his seat as Lord until he recovers—all while teaching herself to control the magical spark smoldering inside her.
Together, Callan and Pyra will shape Aelathil’s future. For better or worse, they will stand Sentinel over the people that the King has targeted for destruction. Should they fail, Pyra’s people will be buried in the northern wastes and Callan’s family legacy will be turned to ash.”
I’m not going to lie here when I say that I struggled a little getting through this book, I feel that it would have been a lot more enjoyable were I still in my teens. The plot is quite simple and trope heavy along with some of the characters and they way they were put together, they have small amounts of back story and managed to make me feel slightly attached to them. The main characters of the story had more time invested in them and as such were a little more fleshed out and interesting. The book has some great and interesting moments (Dragon breathing gas as another ignites it, races of large anthropomorphic cat and dog-like people and quite a few other moments which were brilliant) the issue is that they are few and far between the book just didn’t quite grip me as I’m sure the author intended it to. Now as a fantasy book as described it’s not half bad, enjoyable enough but it just didn’t grip me in the way some others have.
BUT we mustn’t forget that this is a debut so I’d like to suggest some creative criticism. Firstly let’s address the characters Callan and Pyra were strong points and both had some quite good development and time spent getting attached to them, Murdock and the paladin (Whose name sadly escapes me) had some nice moments and remained interesting. But the side characters often felt quite trope heavy, the old mercenary who trained Callan for example. I feel like you were aiming for quite traditional fantasy and that’s not a bad thing at all, look at D&D still going after all these years. Because it takes those tropes and gives them a fresh lick of paint and adds new monsters, worlds and so on.
We say in D&D (And I feel the same if true for writing) everything is cliche and has been done before. But that isn’t bad, sticking with a staple thing people love and have always loved and giving it a nice tweak is excellent (See earlier statement about the dragon combo, awesome!). I also feel the world would benefit from some more showing as opposed to telling, seeing characters interact with the world as they pass through it is great and it allows us to learn more about them based on those interactions. Chad all in all I think you have a very good foundation here it’s a good book, but to become a great one I think that moving away from or adding a new flourish to some of the tropes, showing as much as if not more than telling and focusing on making all of your characters interesting would greatly benefit a good book and make it brilliant.
So would I recommend this book? Yes, I think I would if you are looking for quite a simple easy read I’d also strongly recommend it as a young adult fantasy book because to me at least it felt that way. If you’re looking for either of those things you should definitely pick it up and I’d also suggest this to parents looking for entry-level fantasy for children. If you fit into those categories give it a look I feel you would get a lot more enjoyment out of it.
July 23, 2016
Final thoughts: I might remember this book for a while, but it won't be because I found the experience to be enjoyable. Reading it was quite the opposite.
I was disappointed by the wasted potential here. Character and world building feel forced, not organic to the story. In addition, sometimes details don't feel internally consistent. The narration assumes the reader has a poor memory and thus repeats itself regularly. The author does not appear to trust his audience to make inferences. Too many things are told, rather than shown. Grammar issues abound, including mixed up words, improper punctuation, and missing words. While no author (or reviewer) is grammatically perfect all the time, a problem exists when the book is rife with errors. I highly recommend the author at least run Microsoft Word's built-in spelling and grammar check, and also review some texts on writing. Even watching the School House Rock: Grammar sequences could be beneficial, particularly in regards to the authors' abuse of pronouns.
I felt very let down by this book. Quite often, I felt as though I was reading a first-round NaNoWriMo draft that was then shipped to the publisher by mistake and no one caught the error before the book went to print. The book did not do its wonderful cover justice.
This review could go on for quite a bit longer, but I would prefer to end it here rather than beat a dead horse.
I don't want to discourage the author from writing. I honestly do hope that his skill and talent improve and I would be interested in reading his work when that happens.
Until then, I will find other, better books to read.
I was disappointed by the wasted potential here. Character and world building feel forced, not organic to the story. In addition, sometimes details don't feel internally consistent. The narration assumes the reader has a poor memory and thus repeats itself regularly. The author does not appear to trust his audience to make inferences. Too many things are told, rather than shown. Grammar issues abound, including mixed up words, improper punctuation, and missing words. While no author (or reviewer) is grammatically perfect all the time, a problem exists when the book is rife with errors. I highly recommend the author at least run Microsoft Word's built-in spelling and grammar check, and also review some texts on writing. Even watching the School House Rock: Grammar sequences could be beneficial, particularly in regards to the authors' abuse of pronouns.
I felt very let down by this book. Quite often, I felt as though I was reading a first-round NaNoWriMo draft that was then shipped to the publisher by mistake and no one caught the error before the book went to print. The book did not do its wonderful cover justice.
This review could go on for quite a bit longer, but I would prefer to end it here rather than beat a dead horse.
I don't want to discourage the author from writing. I honestly do hope that his skill and talent improve and I would be interested in reading his work when that happens.
Until then, I will find other, better books to read.
January 11, 2016
Good book
I recommend reading this book if you like fantasy. There were some errors, but took nothing away from the elements of the story. Again recommend this. Can't wait to read the next book.
I recommend reading this book if you like fantasy. There were some errors, but took nothing away from the elements of the story. Again recommend this. Can't wait to read the next book.
January 29, 2016
Just alright
The book was alright, nothing to write home about. I actually skipped around because I got bored. Not bad but not great.
The book was alright, nothing to write home about. I actually skipped around because I got bored. Not bad but not great.
Read
March 30, 2016I loved this book! A nice and simple read. Loved the visani. I really feel like this world Chad created is real. Looking forward to the coming books!
June 29, 2016
Great first novel! I loved the story and can't wait to see what happens next!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews