elliehamilton38's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
joie711's review against another edition
3.0
Pretty good, but it read like a history book with all of the battles. I enjoyed Merlin’s backstory, it felt very real and believable.
autumndragyn's review against another edition
5.0
I still love it. (And my preteen crush on Ambrosius is still strong!)
roe_bookworm's review against another edition
2.0
I... I don’t know. It was a lot. I read it pretty fast, and I onestly enjoyed the first part. Let’s say the second quarter of it? But the second half... oh man! I had so much trouble to find something to like, just to keep reading.
I didn’t care about Merlin, I didn’t like Uther, or any other character except for Cadal. And that’s one of the reasons why I gave it two stars.
It was too descriptive, too. Very well done descriptions, I’ll give you that, but so many! There were so many!
These are basically the things I didn’t like about this book, but there’s one more point: the protagonist had so few emotions, it was like reading the life of a stone! I mean, do you have any emotion? The only time I saw something was in the dialogues between him and Cadal! (And that’s why I loved him so much!)
Oh, well, enough ranting. I read it. I met my 2019 goal. I’m happy.
I didn’t care about Merlin, I didn’t like Uther, or any other character except for Cadal. And that’s one of the reasons why I gave it two stars.
It was too descriptive, too. Very well done descriptions, I’ll give you that, but so many! There were so many!
These are basically the things I didn’t like about this book, but there’s one more point: the protagonist had so few emotions, it was like reading the life of a stone! I mean, do you have any emotion? The only time I saw something was in the dialogues between him and Cadal! (And that’s why I loved him so much!)
Oh, well, enough ranting. I read it. I met my 2019 goal. I’m happy.
sillypunk's review against another edition
1.0
This was so boring: http://blogendorff.ghost.io/book-review-the-crystal-cave/
evakuj's review against another edition
5.0
as i remembered so well written lovely flow go the language still love the story
kylearnzen's review against another edition
3.0
A promising start to what I hope will turn out to be a great series. I actually read this book in elementary school and thought it was incredibly boring, but this go-around I enjoyed it much more. It struck me as more of a set-up to the sequels; there was a lack of action and not enough plot movement to make this book really stand on its own.
saoki's review against another edition
3.0
Mary Stewart's arthurian saga is a Famed Fantasy Classic of the kind that's so low fantasy it feels more like alternate history, though the author chose to use names and place names that would be "easier to recognize" over historically accurate ones (and they might be easier on a native. I don't know, I'm not familiar with the history or geography so I used The Fantasy Book Reading Toolset™ and assumed the story would inform me of anything important).
I liked Merlin and would probably have loved him very much had I read this book in my teens, but every other character in the story was either a manly man of war or a slave, and both kinds had little personality beyond their roles. The women existed, but had even more limited roles, which might feel historically correct but is more like a overwriting of women's role in history (in a pastoral society no one is left to do nothing and stare out windows, there is too much work to be done). Also, I felt like there weren't enough relatives to all those kings, but maybe that was on purpose so that there would be a succession crisis. The result was that world felt underpopulated and left me wondering who planted the crops that fed those armies, who wove the cloths that robed them, who mined the ore for their weapons and who moved all this product through the treacherous roads (though merchants and farms are mentioned, just not shown).
All this happens because the story is told in broad strokes, focusing on the big action pieces, the war victories, the meaningful omens. There is nothing specially wrong about that, but it was just not what I was expecting. It feels dated, and maybe it is.
I liked Merlin and would probably have loved him very much had I read this book in my teens, but every other character in the story was either a manly man of war or a slave, and both kinds had little personality beyond their roles. The women existed, but had even more limited roles, which might feel historically correct but is more like a overwriting of women's role in history (in a pastoral society no one is left to do nothing and stare out windows, there is too much work to be done). Also, I felt like there weren't enough relatives to all those kings, but maybe that was on purpose so that there would be a succession crisis. The result was that world felt underpopulated and left me wondering who planted the crops that fed those armies, who wove the cloths that robed them, who mined the ore for their weapons and who moved all this product through the treacherous roads (though merchants and farms are mentioned, just not shown).
All this happens because the story is told in broad strokes, focusing on the big action pieces, the war victories, the meaningful omens. There is nothing specially wrong about that, but it was just not what I was expecting. It feels dated, and maybe it is.
swissmunicipal's review against another edition
4.0
I'd forgotten what Mary Stewart's writing was like. In some ways, it is similar to R. R. Martin's writing in his Game of Thrones series, but somehow in a way that, while slightly less epic, is much much more appealing to me. But it has that almost historical feel - particularly given that it revolves around a known myth. Fun to read it again!