Matt McAvoy Book Review

A.A. Smith is a fine writer, and has crafted a genuinely intriguing and interesting world, where people are judged by their ability to do magic or the reputation of their peoples.  In it, Mora, a naïve and somewhat innocent teenager at the start, learns hard truths about life and grows up the hard way, through a very unexpected adventure and some genuinely heart-rending and poignant discoveries, against the backdrop of tension and conflict.  As you have surely guessed, there is a great deal in this book which could be construed as metaphor for real life – and that is the beauty of the fantasy genre; it can be used as a device to reflect contemporary society with the most artistic and creative brush.

When you reach the end of this book, you realize that it is mostly the character origin and development instalment of a series in the making.  The story itself, which is very promising, and intriguing from the outset, ultimately might leave you seething a touch, though, for, rather than a cliffhanger ending, this one just abruptly pushes you off and tells you to come back later, which is something which admittedly niggles me a great deal .  That said, I don’t feel it leaves much unresolved in the context of current events, but rather establishes a wider picture.

I have to be completely honest, whilst I absolutely admire Smith’s genuine writing skill and talent for the craft, I felt a slight imbalance between character interaction and action sequences.  There is some of the latter, but scant in comparison, and it appears rather more in passing, which is a shame, because this book seems to have some great setpieces.  All in all, it seems rather more inclined toward establishing characters and their relationships to each other, as well as the class, ableist and race metaphors.  All this is great, don’t get me wrong, and the author does it fantastically well, but I would have liked to see the genuinely quite thrilling action elaborated upon a great deal further.  The outcome in its current form is a slow burner which, in truth, I occasionally struggled to keep engaged with for long periods.  The characters are superb, and presentation of the book was very professional, but I often went drifting off elsewhere.  However, it is a decent and worthy entry in the otherworld fantasy genre, though I do recommend it may be best suited to fans of the genre looking for a promising series, and prepared to engross themselves in character-led series establishment.  As for Smith, definitely an author to follow.