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Ebook462 pages6 hours
Into the Dark Lands
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
4/5
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About this ebook
A Locus selection for Best First Fantasy Novel: The tale of a healer who must wield a sword to protect her people . . .
War has its cost, and the Servants of the Bright Heart and the Servants of the Dark Heart have been locked in a struggle that has defined life—and death—for millennia. But the end is coming, and only the Lady who has served the Bright Heart for the whole of her immortal life has seen it, in a vision that spans time and demands the highest of prices.
Erin is a healer, and against the nature of her birthright she has learned to wield a sword and use it to bring death to the enemies of her people. Scarred by the losses that war always demands, she is the chosen champion of Light and the enemy of darkness.
But no magical sword or simple quest awaits Erin. Her journey and her doom lie in the Dark Heart’s stronghold, and in the hands of her people’s greatest enemy.
War has its cost, and the Servants of the Bright Heart and the Servants of the Dark Heart have been locked in a struggle that has defined life—and death—for millennia. But the end is coming, and only the Lady who has served the Bright Heart for the whole of her immortal life has seen it, in a vision that spans time and demands the highest of prices.
Erin is a healer, and against the nature of her birthright she has learned to wield a sword and use it to bring death to the enemies of her people. Scarred by the losses that war always demands, she is the chosen champion of Light and the enemy of darkness.
But no magical sword or simple quest awaits Erin. Her journey and her doom lie in the Dark Heart’s stronghold, and in the hands of her people’s greatest enemy.
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Reviews for Into the Dark Lands
Rating: 4.2 out of 5 stars
4/5
5 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book feels like it has two halves: the first is your typical fantasy wartime plot (I love the social/magic hierarchy the author created) and the second feels like a re-telling of Beauty and the Beast. The abrupt switch to a fantasy romance is a bit jarring, but enjoyable, nonetheless. I'm not entirely convinced on what Erin finds so compelling in Stephanos, but am invested enough in them to read the rest of the series.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I read this one because I it was described to me as high fantasy with a good, very dark romance. The first half of the book traces the heroine's childhood and early adulthood - growing up as a high-caste warrior and healer for the God of Light. The novel jumps from key moment to key moment so we get a sort of highlights reel of everything that happened during Erin's early years.
The meat of the novel - the Beauty and the Beast tale - gets started about halfway through, when Stefanos, the #1 guy on the dark side, captures Erin. He's a Darkwalker and he feeds on pain and suffering, but thus far the Darkwalkers haven't been able to feed on people like Erin, who's blood is linked so tightly to the God of Light as to be unpalatable and not very nourishing. Stefanos decides that he's going to figure out how to do the impossible and feed on Erin, so he takes her prisoner instead of killing her.
The romance itself is, indeed, a very dark one but fairly satisfying. Because of some tragic incidents in Erin's past, she's not afraid of dying - but she's very afraid of falling in love, so Stefanos, who thrives on pain and fear, finds himself drawn to emotions to which he's not generally exposed. Tenderness and consideration don't come naturally to him, but then, he's not one to fret or worry; he accepts his change of heart and keeps his talons sharp by punishing anyone who tries to question his soft spot for Erin, which is most everyone.
So I enjoyed the romance but two things about [[ASIN:193210058X Into the Dark Lands (The Sundered, Book 1)]] really frustrated me.
(1) Not enough description. There is so little description it's kind of like the high-fantasy equivalent of Lars Von Trier's Dogville set, or maybe someone waving a flashlight around in a dark room. I never had a very good sense of place, of the atmosphere, of characters taking up space or engaging in a fully fleshed out world. My senses were not engaged, even if my emotions were.
(2) During the first half of the novel, before Erin is taken prisoner, she's a tough, no-nonsense warrior type. She loses her father at a young age, trains as a soldier, her mother is scarred by the death of her father and becomes emotionally distant, then dies while Erin is young, sleeps with her sword and never wears pants. Basically, pre-Stefanos Erin is a driven, hard-nosed brute. Once Stefanos steps into the picture she turns into this dress-wearing, weepy, self-sacrificing girly-girl. To me, it felt like two different people - not the evolution of a single character through different circumstances. I felt like readers are supposed to remember Erin's past and think she's complex and let Sagara West off the hook as far as actually writing her as a complex person. That felt like cheating to me.
The book ends on a cliffhanger but, honestly, I doubt I'll be reading further in the series - more than anything else because I don't like the vague, dreamy feeling of reading a fantasy so short on description. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This one had such wildly different protagonists - he was not your usual hero by any means - and she was pretty much who you'd expect as a heroine. Spicy.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This is an early work of Michelle Sagara's, and it definitely shows - while it's got hints of the strengths her later works possess, the very standard "virtuous heroine and dark hero" romance was a little *too* standard for my liking.