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A review by shawn_afk
The Shadow of What Was Lost by James Islington
3.0
I went into this book knowing that it became something very unique and interesting by the end and that knowledge is about all that got me through an extremely lackluster opening.
Around the first half to three quarters of this book feel like very generic Lord of the Rings fantasy. There's a special object that needs to be escorted to a certain place and a group of young character will make their way there with the assistance of some older mentor figures.
This is something that Wheel of Time ran into with its first few books, but that series had characters that I instantly latched onto and was interested in following. This book did not have that. By the end of the book, I was interested in probably 3/4ths of the cast, but I spent the whole book hoping that it would move away from the main lead's point of view.
Once the book started to grow into itself around the halfway to three quarters mark, I started to enjoy it a lot more, and the ending of the book is pretty great. It really drags the book up a lot, to the point where I debated giving it four stars, but was unable to because of just how bored I had been during most of the book.
On the good side, there's a twist in this book that I think might be one of my favorite twists in a book. I put it up there with some of my favorite reveals in Brandon Sanderson's books. I also really really enjoyed reading about Caeden, he was my favorite character in the book by far.
The book came together enough in the end to the point where I'm definitely going to continue reading the series, but I'm not in a rush to do so.
Around the first half to three quarters of this book feel like very generic Lord of the Rings fantasy. There's a special object that needs to be escorted to a certain place and a group of young character will make their way there with the assistance of some older mentor figures.
This is something that Wheel of Time ran into with its first few books, but that series had characters that I instantly latched onto and was interested in following. This book did not have that. By the end of the book, I was interested in probably 3/4ths of the cast, but I spent the whole book hoping that it would move away from the main lead's point of view.
Once the book started to grow into itself around the halfway to three quarters mark, I started to enjoy it a lot more, and the ending of the book is pretty great. It really drags the book up a lot, to the point where I debated giving it four stars, but was unable to because of just how bored I had been during most of the book.
On the good side, there's a twist in this book that I think might be one of my favorite twists in a book. I put it up there with some of my favorite reveals in Brandon Sanderson's books. I also really really enjoyed reading about Caeden, he was my favorite character in the book by far.
The book came together enough in the end to the point where I'm definitely going to continue reading the series, but I'm not in a rush to do so.