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A review by lostinagoodbook
Time's Demon: Book II of the Islevale Cycle by D.B. Jackson
3.0
Disclaimer: I received this book free from Netgalley in return for an unbiased review.
I’ve been fighting with myself over this review. I enjoyed the first book in this series. But this second installment has failed to capture me and I’m feeling disappointed. I don’t want to give it 3 stars but that’s where I am.
First I’d like to talk about what I liked. This book opens with a recap for the first book!! I LOVE this feature. I really wish that other series would adopt this method. I have a really bad memory, especially when there has been a gap between books, I frequently have to go back and re-read a first book in order to familiarize myself with the plot before I continue. Not so bad when it’s a small series, but imagine when Winds of Winter comes out and I have to re-read all of Game of Thrones to get caught up! Oh it’s happening. But not this time. I was so happy to feel caught up when I started Time’s Demon.
A lot of the interesting elements of the story are still here in this second novel. The time travel, the multiple interesting creatures that inhabit the world, the excellent world building, and the diversity of the main cast of characters. These were all things I loved about the first book.
However, I feel like the story itself has derailed. The focus in this book has switched from Tobias, the main character in the first book, to a couple of new characters in this book and with that change some of my interest has died. I feel that with this expansion of point of view, the story has started to become unfocused, and focus in a time travel book is crucial. I’m starting to lose the thread. I’m not sure where they are going. I realized 3/4 of the way through this book that I don’t know what the point is. Are they trying to get back to their time? Biding their time until they catch up with their original time stream? Just staying alive? What are we doing here?
The time-travel aspects of the story are also starting to unravel a little bit. We are starting to get into the scenario where if we go forward in time to stop something that happens in the past but we meet ourselves then what! Will we all stop existing and the time space continuum will dissolve … or was that Star Trek? I’m getting confused. I honestly don’t know how an author can possibly write a time travel book and not run into these dilemma. It’s a head-scratcher for sure.
As I said, I’m conflicted about this book. I really liked the first one. I like the author. I’m just feeling a little lost.
I’ve been fighting with myself over this review. I enjoyed the first book in this series. But this second installment has failed to capture me and I’m feeling disappointed. I don’t want to give it 3 stars but that’s where I am.
First I’d like to talk about what I liked. This book opens with a recap for the first book!! I LOVE this feature. I really wish that other series would adopt this method. I have a really bad memory, especially when there has been a gap between books, I frequently have to go back and re-read a first book in order to familiarize myself with the plot before I continue. Not so bad when it’s a small series, but imagine when Winds of Winter comes out and I have to re-read all of Game of Thrones to get caught up! Oh it’s happening. But not this time. I was so happy to feel caught up when I started Time’s Demon.
A lot of the interesting elements of the story are still here in this second novel. The time travel, the multiple interesting creatures that inhabit the world, the excellent world building, and the diversity of the main cast of characters. These were all things I loved about the first book.
However, I feel like the story itself has derailed. The focus in this book has switched from Tobias, the main character in the first book, to a couple of new characters in this book and with that change some of my interest has died. I feel that with this expansion of point of view, the story has started to become unfocused, and focus in a time travel book is crucial. I’m starting to lose the thread. I’m not sure where they are going. I realized 3/4 of the way through this book that I don’t know what the point is. Are they trying to get back to their time? Biding their time until they catch up with their original time stream? Just staying alive? What are we doing here?
The time-travel aspects of the story are also starting to unravel a little bit. We are starting to get into the scenario where if we go forward in time to stop something that happens in the past but we meet ourselves then what! Will we all stop existing and the time space continuum will dissolve … or was that Star Trek? I’m getting confused. I honestly don’t know how an author can possibly write a time travel book and not run into these dilemma. It’s a head-scratcher for sure.
As I said, I’m conflicted about this book. I really liked the first one. I like the author. I’m just feeling a little lost.