JonDThe Silver Road
September 17th 2006 05:53
The Silver Road - Grace Dugan
The Silver Road follows the lives of Zuven, a 16 year old foundling with a mysterious past, Yelala (the character that stands out most) a noblewoman who has dedicated her life as a soldier, and Haga, eldest son of a baron and has dedicated his life to rebellion. Together their lives intertwine as they try to kick evil old king off the throne.
I'll let you in to a little spoiler: The three of them will never succeed in usurping the king. The king will be kicked off by somebody else, and will be replaced by another evil old king before these three finally succeeds what they were planning to do.
You know what's lacking in this story? A good relationship between the characters instead of just a "meh" kind of thing between them. The only characters who actually gets a good relationship are Yelala and Flite, and you'll only get it in Chapter 50 of the overall 59 chapters of the book. The other two characters, Zuven and Haga, are a little hostile and sounded to me like they were just using each other.
Another thing is establishing a sort of reader-character relationship. I found the two main characters (Zuven and Haga) quite unlikeable (Like how I found myself disliking Fanny Price of Mansfield Park). One way to establish this relationship is to maybe invite the readers to decipher messages, add mysteries and intrigue, etc.
Nevertheless, I really enjoyed this novel. Being 6 years in the making, Dugal certainly did a great job on it. It's not the same as other fantasy books out there. The plot here is very compact, and anything "fantastical" is kept to a minimum. This book reminds me of Lian Hearn's The Otori Trilogy in terms of characters, setting, and plot.
This novel can be bought from bookstores everywhere for $20 ($19.95 at Dymocks).
I rate this novel:
8/10
//Book cover from http://ozhorrorscope.blogspot.com/2006/08/review-silver-road-by-grace-dugan.html
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