Alleen de Waardige

The Way of Steel #1

by Morgan Rice

Morgan Rice, #1 Bestverkopende auteur van DE TOVENAARSRING, komt met een meeslepende nieuwe fantasy serie.

ALLEEN DE WAARDIGE (De Weg van Staal—Boek 1) vertelt het epische verhaal van de zeventienjarige Royce, een boerenjongen met speciale krachten, die voelt dat hij anders is dan de andere jongens in zijn dorp. Er zit een kracht in hem die hij niet begrijpt, en een verborgen lotsbestemming die hij niet onder ogen durft te komen.

Op de dag dat hij op het punt staat te trouwen met zijn enige ware liefde, Genevieve, wordt ze hem afgenomen. Royce kiest ervoor om alles op het spel te zetten en de confrontatie aan te gaan met de adel die haar heeft meegenomen, in een poging zijn geliefde te redden. Wanneer hij faalt, wordt hij verbannen naar het beruchte Zwarte Eiland, een plek die erom bekend staat om jongens in mannen te veranderen. Verbannen uit zijn thuisland moet Royce talloze beproevingen doorstaan. Hij leert hoe hij moet overleven in de beruchte Krochten—de wrede bloedsport van het Koninkrijk. Genevieve, die wanhopig op Royce’ terugkeer wacht, wordt gedwongen om haar weg te vinden in de wrede, samenspannende wereld van de aristocratie, en wordt ondergedompeld in een leven dat ze veracht.

Maar terwijl Royce’ krachten sterker worden en hij erachter komt dat er een geheim zit achter de mysterieuze afkomst van zijn vader, beseft hij dat zijn lotsbestemming wellicht groter is dan hij had gedacht. Hij verwondert zich over de vraag die hem altijd het meest had beangstigd: wie is hij?

ALLEEN DE WAARDIGE vertelt een episch verhaal over vrienden en geliefden, over ridders en eer, over verraad, het lot en liefde. Dit verhaal over moed sleept ons mee in een fantasiewereld waar we verliefd op zullen worden, een wereld die alle leeftijden aanspreekt.

Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult, Audiobook, Fiction, Ebooks, Romance, Paranormal

241 pages, Kindle Edition

Published June 15, 2016

About the author

Morgan Rice is the #1 bestselling and USA Today bestselling author of the epic fantasy series THE SORCERER’S RING, comprising seventeen books; of the #1 bestselling series THE VAMPIRE JOURNALS, comprising twelve books; of the #1 bestselling series THE SURVIVAL TRILOGY, a post-apocalyptic thriller comprising three books; of the epic fantasy series KINGS AND SORCERERS, comprising six books; of the epic fantasy series OF CROWNS AND GLORY, comprising 8 books; of the new epic fantasy series A THRONE FOR SISTERS, comprising eight books (and counting); and of the new science fiction series THE INVASION CHRONICLES. Morgan’s books are available in audio and print editions, and translations are available in over 25 languages.

TURNED (Book #1 in the Vampire Journals), ARENA ONE (Book #1 of the Survival Trilogy), A QUEST OF HEROES (Book #1 in the Sorcerer’s Ring) and RISE OF THE DRAGONS (Kings and Sorcerers—Book #1) are each available as free downloads!

Morgan loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.morganricebooks.com to join the email list, receive a free book, receive free giveaways, download the free app, get the latest exclusive news, connect on Facebook and Twitter, and stay in touch!

Reviews

[Keith · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a bad book. To sum up briefly:

-It's badly written (numerous typographical and continuity errors, bad word choices, repeating of information).
-It's badly characterized (unsubtle good-and-evil stereotypes, character development delivered through tedious exposition rather than action or dialogue).
-It's badly plotted (events ignored by characters, events happening far too fast, characters and other elements abruptly introduced when they're needed rather than being set up in advance).
-It's almost entirely lacking in proper fantasy world-building (we learn very little about the setting either through exposition or through action/dialogue and what little we do learn is frequently confusing, and among the few actual fantasy elements are silly identikit monsters).
-Its tone is hopelessly confused (its relentlessly grim setting jars with some elements, like overly idealistic characters and a videogame-esque mini-quest, and it bills itself, at least on the Kindle Store, as being suitable for all ages despite huge amounts of violence and brutality as well as non-graphic sexual content including rape).
-It's lacking in imagination, recycling elements familiar from other fantasy and even from the author's own earlier books.

To go into more detail:

Regular readers of my reviews and comments will know that I've had a lot to say about the mass-produced writings (17 books in ~2 years in the Sorcerer's Ring series alone) of Morgan Rice, so this negative review will come as no surprise to them. What may be surprising is that I would label this as Rice's worst book that I've read to date. Relevant to this is the first point I want to raise before getting into an extended critique of this book.

A common response to angry reviews of Rice's books (and similar works) is that snooty critics shouldn't over-analyze things which are just supposed to be fluffy, escapist, un-demanding entertainment, often aimed at younger readers. I want to address this in relation to Only The Worthy: in my opinion, it is most definitely not fluffy, escapist fantasy for children or young teenagers to enjoy. In my comments on Rice's Quest of Heroes, I've frequently cited elements of its content which parents very likely might not consider suitable for under-12s (or even older offspring depending on their views). This book is significantly darker, and it lacks most of the wish-fulfillment elements of Quest of Heroes; the young protagonists spend the majority of the book being abused, brutalized, tormented and tyrannized. Any argument that it should be judged less harshly than "serious, adult" books is therefore hopelessly invalid, in my opinion (not that I think it's a particularly good argument in the first place to claim that a light book aimed at younger readers shouldn't be criticized for shoddy writing).

With that said, let's get on to the many, many, many, many things wrong with this book. A lot of information can be found below in the copious (and increasingly demented, as the book took a toll on my sanity) notes I kept while reading. In particular, these detail the many basic language and continuity errors I found, all of which should surely have been caught by a professional editor (which I am not). This leads me to assume that, despite seemingly wanting to present themselves as a best-selling professional author rather than a humble, enthusiastic amateur, Rice is still not bothering to even commission a professional to give their books a quick once-over before publication. These errors include but are most certainly not limited to:

-Frequent and often repeated misuse/misplacement of words and phrases, such as "cobblestone" being used where "cobblestones" is clearly the correct term, or "by pain of death" in place of "on pain of death".
-A completely confused timeline of events with timeskips that don't line up with each other when cutting between Royce and Genevieve's viewpoints. For example, we're told that "six moons had passed" between two of Genevieve's chapters, yet in Royce's chapters there have been two six-moon timeskips in the same portion of the book.
-Numerous instances of the author seemingly forgetting facts established only a few paragraphs earlier, such as being inconsistent as to whether one dozen or several dozen boys are still alive at one point in Royce's training, or ignoring the fact that a beast Royce is fighting has two heads when he chokes it to death (there's no mention of him crushing both of its windpipes to prevent it from simply breathing through its spare throat).

Beyond these numerous individual errors, there are several scenes and plot elements which break suspension of disbelief, show laziness/lack of imagination on the part of the author, jar with the tone of the rest of the book or are otherwise annoying. These include:

-As noted near the beginning of this review, the mini-quest Royce and his fellow survivors are sent on for their final initiation feels very out of place in a grimdark, mud-spattered book that obviously desperately wants to ride on the coat-tails of Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire. They're sent to the "Cave of Madness" to recover "the Crystal Sword" and fight a monster called the "Mantra" (named, presumably, either in a misplaced fit of irony or because Morgan Rice doesn't realize that's a real word with a well-known, very different meaning). Said monster is a thoroughly uninspired creation that sounds like a six-year-old's crayon drawing ("The beast resembled a bear, with its long, brown fur, yet was ten times the size, with a single, glowing red eye, sharpened yellow claws, and two long horns protruding from the sides of its head"). This whole setup, especially the silly names, feels like something out of The Princess Bride or a light-hearted video game. Assuming Rice isn't just lifting the "fetch quest" idea wholesale from gaming, this is presumably an attempt to reference myths and fairytales where heroes confront a monster in a cave. Unfortunately, without any setup, backstory or anything else to give any emotional strength to it, this remains just a misplaced video game fetch quest.
-The nobles of the kingdom where all this takes place are established from the beginning as proud, rapacious, and very much looking down on their subjects. Yet when one of their own, Altfor, decides (because she ~has spirit~, or whatever) to marry Genevieve, a peasant girl, instead of simply taking her as a mistress/concubine/sex slave/whatever as his father intended, there isn't a single mention of any of the nobles objecting, and "hundreds" of them turn up to the wedding and "nod approvingly". This makes little to no sense, certainly not without further explanation which isn't forthcoming.
-The prison/training programme Royce is sent to seems bafflingly elaborate and wasteful. Boys are sent on crowded prison ships (where most of them die, at least on the one we see, due to starvation/infighting/the weather/etc.) to a desolate island where they are then death-marched (again, killing most of those still alive) to a cave to be trained extensively as part of some sort of twisted warrior brotherhood. These well-trained warriors, equipped with blinged-out weapons and armour, are then...thrown into muddy fighting pits in small villages to fight for people's entertainment. They also don't seem to be deliberately inured to killing (since Royce and his friends angst about killing in the arena) which you would think would be considered important. I could understand this elaborate training (which unfortunately comes across as a watered-down knockoff of other examples in fantasy, like the Unsullied from A Song of Ice and Fire) if these slave gladiators were actually treated as valuable at the end of the line (e.g. being exhibited in a grand arena like Rome's Colosseum, their lives not being thrown away because of the investment put into them), but they aren't. The alleged warrior brotherhood of those who survive the training also seems like an obvious setup for rebellion (how do the trainers back on the island feel about their skilled trainees being sent off to die in fleapits in front of a few idiots?), but nothing is made of this.
-The last fifth or so of the book, after many long and dreary chapters of repetitive brutality and unpleasantness, suddenly ramps the pace up to 11, as Royce kills a noble (in a scene directly ripped off from Rice's earlier book, Arena One) and starts a revolution. This pace is completely unrealistic - hundreds of medieval peasants are able to mobilize into an army in the space of maybe 24-48 hours, organize a raid on the conveniently nearby place where Royce's friends are conveniently all being held, ride through the night (all these downtrodden peasants inexplicably seem to own horses) to reach a distant domain, and even find time to locate a character who can reveal that - le gasp! - Royce is the son of a previous king.

[Dennis Fahey · Rating 1 out of 5]

Another simplistic unoriginal coming of age series

Drivel. Every events result is utterly predictable. Another orphan with mysterious powers, defies all odds and triumphantly survives. Oh, and his true love winds up married and preggy with utterly evil bad guy. Pass. I got this free and still,feel cheated.

[Diesel Reads Books · Rating 1 out of 5]

I actually feel duped.
The first three chapters (as much as kindle lets you preview before buying) were awesome. Really engaging, really exciting. Instant buy. But the second I opened the bought version to read chapter 4, I knew I had made a mistake.
The level of writing decreased within a page. It became sloppy and disengaging, which was really confusing, especially since it had started off so well. Phrases and words are constantly repeated mere lines after their first use. Some characters talk in overly poetic paragraphs, yet the world building and the description of action leave a lot to be desired. It was very odd.
Rice doesn't seem to remember who was where and when, either. Many of the characters seem lost in their own story, having to be filled in on plot lines which they were physically present for when the scene took place. Because of this, I found myself frustrated with the reactions of many of the characters, as their emotions towards things were unjustified and out of no where, as if they were discovering facts for the first time yet weren't.
An important part of the story is the reaction of certain characters towards Genevieve because of her circumstance, yet they all acted like they couldn't understand how she had gotten into that situation and judged her for it....even though one of the main plots of the story is how she ended up there - which again is something all said characters were present for?
The bad guys are caricatures, with stale lines and no dimension. To be honest most of the spoken lines in this book are stale.
I could go on but I won't. Enough ranting. Needless to say I won't be carrying on with this series, and wouldn't recommend it.

[Coco.V]

🎁 FREE on Amazon today (3/8/2020)! 🎁

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

As several reviewers have noted, this book started off decently but seemed to steadily go down hill. I even remarked to my wife that I was reading a book with good premise but seemed the writing was done by a young child. I actually couldn't finish the book, I got about half way through and just didn't feel like wasting any more time on it. It is rare when I do this and am disappointed it was rated 4 starts on Kindle list. I think some will like the simplistic writing though, especially YA readers. So I may change rating to 3 but for now feel a solid 2. Again, the premise is decent but nothing original so no real surprises.

[Agnese · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book isn't good. It's basically a Deus Ex Machina manual with some plot inbetween, many plot devices make no sense, it's like reading the script for a '90 fantasy tv series.
THAT SAID, I actually quite enjoyed it, it's accidentaly funny and a quick read (I finished it in few hours).

[Bailey Loveless · Rating 1 out of 5]

The bottom of the dick lit genre—lots of swinging swords but reads like something Ai would write.
The audiobook narrator is giving his all but alas, dog poop has more style and substance than these characters.

This book is its own special cave of madness 🫠

[Mr Anthony J May · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rubbish fantasy start of series

Nobles rape and pillage peasants at whim. Brave boy try to save girl friend. The hero and setting was rubbish. Example of what I mean is the hero placed on island and a100 veteran soldiers had to beat up the 20 or so recruits all the others beaten except the hero who miraculous ly beats them all. Also a cavalry charge takes a castle. Very little understanding of medieval combat.

[Jim Gingrich · Rating 2 out of 5]

Weak, predictable, and hastily written

Don't know where to start other than to say to read something else. Morgan Rice has a few books that I found good, but this seems like it was written just to churn something out. The background is shallow, the characters unlikeable, and the story line so heavy handed. I finished it just to save you all the time. You can thank me later.

[Kris Davidson · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can't add anything new that other reviewers haven't already mentioned except that I have irreversible brain damage from reading this book.

[Jeannette Woodard · Rating 2 out of 5]

Childish vocabulary, lame characters. Why do people seem to feel that juvenile fiction must be childlike writing.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was the epitome of telling. The characters were stereotypes, and despite being barely over 200 pages, I couldn't finish it fast enough. Great idea, poor execution. I don't think I'll read anything else by this author.

[Bryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Audiobook - 2.75 stars. This is about as basic as basic gets. It seemed like the author took parts of other books/movies and kinda glued them together haphazardly. As I was listening to this book I realized, this is probably the crappy story and writing I would come up with if I was forced to write a book. Storylines were simple, characters had no substance, pace was way too fast, and some of it just didn't make sense. For example, the training in the red isle, where they were supposed to get this crystal sword but Royce's group was the first one to succeed: doesn't that mean every other 'recruit' is dead? That's kind of a shitty way to train fighters for the pit if ALL OF THEM DIE.

Still, despite all this, I found it enjoyable as an audiobook for some reason. It was simple enough of a storyline that I really didn't have to pay close attention.

[Erin Penn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Did not finish – stopping at the 37% mark.

So many cliques, and simple solutions, and tired phrases everyone uses. And such, such a modern viewpoint on everything in this medieval world. I can see young teens liking it – but, really, it could be so much more complicated, the characters so much bigger. The medieval world does not need to be dumbed down this much. (See Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Gray Vining – a children's book that is not dumbed down at all.)

The story does move forward in a logical manner, the characters are complete, there are multiple viewpoint which work. Structurally, it is acceptable.

But the mediocre storytelling is not worth my time. I'm cranky and this book kept distracting me with how cliqued it was instead of the story itself.

[TheLiar · Rating 1 out of 5]

A disjointed irritating mess. The author jumped from plot point to plot point, completely forgetting some as the book moved forward. If this had been split into about three books, one for each of the story arcs that the writer crams into this book, and fleshed it all out a lot, then maybe, maybe, it would be readable. Right now, not really.

[Greyscotty · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can't even put in my usual rant about editing - even though it WAS terrible! This was just plain awful. It seems that this author is simply trying to churn out books as fast as possible; quite sad considering my liking for "Of Crowns and Glory." Why not finish a series before moving on? Shades of a very prolific writer from New Mexico!
Get my drift?

[Philip O. Pennington · Rating 1 out of 5]

Drek

How could somebody (anybody) think this person is a good writer? The logic and continuity issues were so blatant and jarring that I could not even finish the book. And he (she?) has written all this OTHER stuff?! Truly amazing. Amazon, you will truly publish anything,huh?

[Agnese · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book isn't good. It's basically a Deus Ex Machina manual with some plot inbetween, many plot devices make no sense, it's like reading the script for a '90 fantasy tv series.
THAT SAID, I actually quite enjoyed it, it's accidentaly funny and a quick read (I finished it in few hours).

[Suki Rickey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book 1

Book 1 was a great read and had errors throughout. The characters and plot are well done and grow as the story progresses. The story is kind of predictable but has a nice quality to it that keeps my interest. I look forward to book 2

[Raaf · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF after 10 pages !!

As a prologue, a young and innocent girl is raped, just to make sure that a heir gets born. Sad, very sad that rape is a "solution" for a "problem" to be solved.

[Kathryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, the story of a boy, Royce who was born after a village is attacked and women were raped and people’s homes burned. Royce’s mother agreed to allow a mysterious white knight to have consensual sex with and afterwards is given a necklace with an unusual emblem with the moon and told to give to the boy and send him to the knight.

The villagers do not want any of the women to have babies from the attack of their village but Royce’s mother refuses to abort her baby even though the whole village is against her. She is isolated and alone when she gives birth to a son the night of a red moon. She is forced to run with her baby to keep the villagers from killing him. During her flight the baby is burned with the image of the necklace on his arm, causing her to throw it since it is hot. She is given refuge by a man but he home is attacked by knights that want to kill the baby also because what he will become. Royce’s mother puts him in a beaver’s floating logs and he is sent floating down the river and saved. His mother is killed by the knights.

Royce is saved and raised by a couple that already have 3 sons. I found that I had a few questions as the story progresses, like what kind of prophecy tells the knights about Royce, why do so many people want him dead? Also once he reaches the Red isle how does the man in charge know whose son Royce is and the other young man, Mark, I would have liked more information about him. He has an unusual mark on his shoulder that is mentioned but never explained. Also we never find out why the other men are sent to the isle.


I also found it strange how the young woman Royce was to marry, is married off to a noble who is the son of a Duke and he comes across as such a nice man, yet when he becomes jealous that Genevieve still loves Royce so his whole personality changes to a mean and vindictive person. I plan to read book two which I am reading next.

[Mandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book wasn't for me. Really it felt predictable. Guy gets betrayed by the girl he loves he still fighting finds out she betrayed him or so he thinks and he runs off. I did like how much action it had with him fighting but overall I hated the book and don't plan on reading the next one. I normally love Morgan Rice I have a bunch of her books but I will not read be reading this series. Also the book left us way too curious over his father also what's up with that beginning. it literally starts out by girl waking up going with the strange guy having sex with you and getting pregnant and then having a baby dying for it and then bam he 17 and a bunch of stuff happening. I felt like there was just no real feelings to the book. I did like Royce's Brothers they seemed like great characters. Again overall I will not be reading more and to be honest I can go on and on about what I hated about this book and what was so predictable. The only reason I gave two stars only because there was one or two good parts. Also what is up with the girl he loves.. Like come on you do not get married and sleep with somebody else when the guy you love did what he did for you like I mean he practically went to his death for her. All she is doing was whoring around with her new husband and trying to play the greater players.. Heck her new sister in law told her not to trust anyone why did she trust her?! Also it was horrid what the husband did her sister. And just from the preview of the next book I bet you she ends up pregnant by that new husband to like so predictable. see I said I wasn't going to say any more and I keep going so I'm just going to stop here.

[Sarah Vespertine · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first chapters pulled me into the story. But after the woman's passing the story grew a bit slow for me and very one-track-minded. I thought "yes, yes we get it! They love each other!" It was a bit much teenage-angst and love for me. But by the last 75% of the story it got interesting again!

The female lead... Well, what else can I say than "Royce". Nothing else mattered to her character, sure she cared a bit for her family but there was no agency or development to her character. Also, I could not help but get a bit pissed off at Royce and his brothers who were made stupid when they felt betrayed by her marrying the noble. Royce should be a smarter character than that and it made me angry at the fact that he couldn't understand her lack of options. Sure, it may have helped getting her POV in understanding her reasoning but even without it the established world building should have helped Royce understand that her marriage to the noble was the only way for her to survive.

The character named Dust was quite intriguing! I thought that was an interesting addition and I enjoyed reading the scenes he appeared in.

As for the isle and the struggles happening there... The idea was fine but I thought it became a bit too... Brutal for the sole fact of being brutal. Just like with the romance, I rolled my eyes and thought "yes, I get it, it is horrible".

I will see if I will read another book in this series, but I am interested in reading another book from this writer!

[MLJ · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really liked the story concept. I even find myself wondering what will happen to Royce and Genevieve, and his brothers: Will they die?
But... not enough to read the next book.
I’m truly curious as to how this author has so many books published. I love her imagination and where she led the story, but the writing was (for lack of a better word) bad... I mean bad enough my mind couldn’t get away from the words on the pages so I could imagine the story unfolding. And isn’t that the best part of a book? When you can lose yourself in a fantasy or faraway world?
I finished this book because my personality forces me to finish what I start. But if I ever read the words “after all” again, it’ll be way too soon. Not to mention the redundancies that had my eyes rolling more than I was reading.
I hate to blame the author, because I have a great respect for anyone who pours out their heart on paper to share with the world. I mostly blame the publishing company and her editors for not pushing her to write better and catching the typos and misnamed people. (If you change the name of a character, change all of them.) Shame on you both. You have not done a good service to your author.

[Dostoevsky's Gambling Addiction · Rating 1 out of 5]

(sorry, my English is bad)

So, first of all, I forgot what the book is even about. The only thing I can remember is, that it was horrendous.

The story telling was really bad, the characters were plain and the PLOT!!!
I don't know, it reminded me of Hunger games (and I have a feeling that Only the worthy is not even worthy to be written next to it in this review) and something else.
I mean, in general, the idea is not that bad, but it's unoriginal. I predicted what was going to happen before I was in half of the book :(. Like: "Oh, everyone's gonna die, but the guy's gonna live because he's the main character". NO, at least try to sacrifice the characters sometimes! I wasn't even able to feel attached to them, they were so poorly written. Oh, and did I mention the PLOT!? Predictable, horrendous and it didn't even make sense.

The only reason why I finished it is that I'm a masochist (I guess), because I just wanted to read some easy fantasy book without other 10 volumes you have to read to understand the story completely, but... I was tortured while reading this. It was horrible.

And this is not my first Morgan Rice book. I stumbled across her randomly while searching for some fantasy novels online and... I found the best-selling author that I've never heard of in the underground section!? Like, okay... I was like... let's try it, but the reviews don't look very good...
I was shocked at how many books the woman already wrote and... I just randomly looked at her books after two years of not following her and... she has another three series with like 10 volumes!?

That's it. When I write in my language, I feel like I'm a horrible author but then I remember Morgan Rice.
And you should do the same :).

[Cindie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I struggle with the concept that this is a fantasy book. To me it is much more historic and based on the historic treatment in Europe during the Middle Ages. I hated most of the story, the abuse of the peasants, the rape of women, because the nobles owned them. I listened to it and then realized the intent is to drag the reader into the story, not really ending, but sucking the reader into finding out what happens next. I struggle with the way women were treated in history and this book is no exception. If Genevieve is really as adept with a sword as she claims, why isn't her husband dead? I may read the next book...just to see what happens, but I will really have to be bored as this was not a pleasant read for me.

[Avid · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thoroughly anticipated very little out of this book after reading the terrible reviews but found to be pleasantly surprised with the audiobook. It was a very different story from my normal reading and it held my curiosity and integrity.

The overall book (& time period) was violent and based on a class system. The main character Royce has a VERY different birth, upbringing, and just as he plans to wed, his wife is swept away to the palace. (Allowed by their law.) Not willing to accept this as his fate, Royce sets off to amend this and get his fiancee back. The story in my eyes was intriguing. I'm not exactly sure why others commented that this should never have been made into a book or gave it only 1 star. It is not my genre and I still enjoyed it. 🤔 Happy reading to you. 👍

[Guido Previde Massara · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK. The book is a mixture of several common themes in fantasy: the coming of age, the hero's journey, the star-crossed lovers, with a bit of Gladiator and heroic berserkr thrown in. It does lack in originality BUT it is well paced and reads easily, which is great if you are going to use it as a reading exercise for learning a second (or n-th) language. I'm reading it in the Dutch translation which, given my limited knowledge, seems a pretty good one. The fact that the book is not extremely original is a blessing in this case because it is easier to "fill the blanks" and infer some parts of the story. The plot is fast enough to make you stick to the book and plough through despite having to resort to the dictionary quite often.

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well this is a hard one. This book was a good read but definitely not one of my favorites from this author. It kind of felt like it took bit's and peices from the Ring series and cobbled it together for a new quick read. Not a lot of new ideas at least in this first novel.
Generally when I Start a Morgan Rice book. It's a wonderful story, combined with Rich characters and a wonderful world. This gets three stars just on the hope it will get better. Don't get me wrong it's still entertaining just not what one would expect from this Author.
Oh I received a copy of this book for an honest review.,.

[Maxine Gannaban · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yes the plot isn't original but it's well written. I loved how the author described the scenes with the right amount of details and the right choice of words. I was able to clearly visualize the story that I remember the pits, the fields, the revolting people and the hardships that Royce went through which I loved the most because he was resilient through it all and he cares about the lives of the soldiers even if they were against him. He is a man of empathy and of pure heart. His father is what I dislike the most in this book. His existence makes Royce's character dull and the book unpleasant.

I'm looking forward to reading the 2nd book.