In the first of what, I hope, will be many looks to fellow authors whom I discover for the first time, I take a look back at my recent read through of A E Marling’s Brood of Bones
A E Marling was one of my first followers on Twitter (And still is, considering I only have 10 at the time of writing!) I decided to add one of his books to my reading list as a way of saying thank you. After all, word of mouth is the author’s best friend. So onto the review:
The characters come across as fairly well-rounded and three-dimensional. Elder Enchantress Hiresha begins the story as a person returning to her home a stranger. She becomes quickly established as someone with failed ambition, prides and fears. She has command of magic, yet that command has its limitations and her affinity for it also causes her problems. The same is true of her gowns, worn as a statement of her achievements but ultimately impractical and even imprisoning. As the story is told in first-person I found myself coming to understand her in a way, and when things seemed as though they were crashing down around her I felt a compulsion to read on.
The other primary character is the Lord of the Feast, an interesting and delightfully sinister fellow who is something of a wildcard. A master of deception, I was never sure whether he was a tragic victim of his magic as he claimed or if he was simply purchasing sympathy to use to his advantage. I hope he is a recurring character.
The secondary characters, whilst present, were not so extensively fleshed out. This is to be expected I suppose but Deepmand and Janny, two characters who spend most of their time in the main character’s company, leave very little in my memory about them.
The story was well put together and flowed naturally, starting out as a rather sinister mystery the twists and turns were both believable and fairly unexpected. The solution to the whodunnit is well foreshadowed; the clues were present but flew under my radar, when it was revealed it felt like the gradual solution of a puzzle rather than the simple presentation of an answer. The threat and fears of the protagonist feel real and lend weight to the final act of the story.
The world felt substantial and well imagined, the various types and mechanics of the few forms of magic with which we are presented show a great power that has limitations and comes at a cost, and once a rule was established it was generally stuck to. I’m always a fan of so-called hard magic systems, where magic is more a tool to be used rather than an arbitrary force that acts at the whim of the author.
All in all I was impressed with the writing style and quality and found the story to be captivating. I will definitely be looking to Marling’s other work in the near future.
I hope to have the time to do more reviews and other spots where I look at other authors. We’ll see how it goes.
