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A review by spiraldots
A Star-Reckoner's Lot by Darrell Drake
3.0
Review originally published on my blog
So I received a copy of this from the author months ago and it’s taken me a while to get around to finally reading as I was saving it for the self-published square of Fantasy Bingo and was trying to not read too much on my Kindle.
Anyway, I finally decided to give it a read when I got Kindle Unlimited and realised I was about to start reading a lot more self-published novels. This book is inspired by 6th century Iran which I don’t know much about and so I am unable to tell how accurate it is, but the setting was absolutely fantastic and was definitely one of the highlights of the book and it definitely makes me want to learn more about 6th century Iran myself which I feel will only just make me appreciate this book even more!
The main plot of the story starts out with Ashtadukht wanting to hunt down the Div that killed her husband, although of course that’s not going to go that smoothly as she keeps being called off to perform her duties as a star-reckoner despite being awful at it. Ashtadukht being awful at her powers is something I really enjoyed as often the main character is incredibly skilled and so seeing her constantly fail or end up with unexpected results was very fun.
As far as writing goes, this was brilliant. It took a while to get used to the writing as the author has a tendency to use his clearly extensive vocabulary but thankfully as I was reading on my Kindle, it was easy enough to look up the unfamiliar words. This meant it was a bit slower to read for me than usual and I got distracted part of the way through which meant there was a slight gap between my reading so the beginning was less fresh in my mind when I went back to it.
One very important thing I should mention about this book is that it starts off slow but just keeps getting better. I wasn’t a big fan of it at the start but wasn’t going to give up so early and I’m glad I stuck with it and the ending, in particular, was brilliant and means I’m definitely going to want to read more by this author!
I’ve not mentioned the characters too much because we don’t know that much about them at the start and slowly learn more about them as the novel progresses and this slow introduction to them all was something I really enjoyed and so I want to save that enjoyment for other readers. One thing I will mention though is that I absolutely adore Waray and her fascination with eggs which constantly amused me throughout the book.
To conclude, despite being a slow start this is definitely worth sticking with and I thoroughly enjoyed this book. If you’re doing the Fantasy Bingo it’s an excellent choice as it fulfills several squares and of course is just an enjoyable read in general. It’s also nice to read a Fantasy book with a very different setting than usual. For those that are hesitant about reading self-published books, I’d recommend this as a great example of how fantastic they can be.
So I received a copy of this from the author months ago and it’s taken me a while to get around to finally reading as I was saving it for the self-published square of Fantasy Bingo and was trying to not read too much on my Kindle.
Anyway, I finally decided to give it a read when I got Kindle Unlimited and realised I was about to start reading a lot more self-published novels. This book is inspired by 6th century Iran which I don’t know much about and so I am unable to tell how accurate it is, but the setting was absolutely fantastic and was definitely one of the highlights of the book and it definitely makes me want to learn more about 6th century Iran myself which I feel will only just make me appreciate this book even more!
The main plot of the story starts out with Ashtadukht wanting to hunt down the Div that killed her husband, although of course that’s not going to go that smoothly as she keeps being called off to perform her duties as a star-reckoner despite being awful at it. Ashtadukht being awful at her powers is something I really enjoyed as often the main character is incredibly skilled and so seeing her constantly fail or end up with unexpected results was very fun.
As far as writing goes, this was brilliant. It took a while to get used to the writing as the author has a tendency to use his clearly extensive vocabulary but thankfully as I was reading on my Kindle, it was easy enough to look up the unfamiliar words. This meant it was a bit slower to read for me than usual and I got distracted part of the way through which meant there was a slight gap between my reading so the beginning was less fresh in my mind when I went back to it.
One very important thing I should mention about this book is that it starts off slow but just keeps getting better. I wasn’t a big fan of it at the start but wasn’t going to give up so early and I’m glad I stuck with it and the ending, in particular, was brilliant and means I’m definitely going to want to read more by this author!
I’ve not mentioned the characters too much because we don’t know that much about them at the start and slowly learn more about them as the novel progresses and this slow introduction to them all was something I really enjoyed and so I want to save that enjoyment for other readers. One thing I will mention though is that I absolutely adore Waray and her fascination with eggs which constantly amused me throughout the book.
To conclude, despite being a slow start this is definitely worth sticking with and I thoroughly enjoyed this book. If you’re doing the Fantasy Bingo it’s an excellent choice as it fulfills several squares and of course is just an enjoyable read in general. It’s also nice to read a Fantasy book with a very different setting than usual. For those that are hesitant about reading self-published books, I’d recommend this as a great example of how fantastic they can be.