A review by annhorchata
Witches of the Dead Kingdom by Ash Oldfield
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.75
Thanks Ash and BookFunnel for providing me with an advanced reader copy of your book! The review below is my honest opinion of the book. The premise is the biggest reason that I requested this ARC, aside from me being a huge fantasy fan. A modern fantasy, set in my current city of Melbourne? Sign me up.
From the get go the first thing I've noticed is that this book is quite short for a fantasy. Having read several series of fantasy before, I am used to books being at least 500 pages long, but according to Storygraph (which is my main reading account), this book is only 252 pages long. I blazed through it quite fast as it is a nice and easy read. However, I couldn't help but feel that because of the short length of the book some of the character development and worldbuilding were rushed, especially in some of the first chapters where a lot of kings and queens characters were introduced. Another thing, which might also be remedied in the printed version (because I was reading on my Kindle) was that the world map was split in half. I loved me a map at the start of the book and managed to stitch together the two halves with a bit of graphic design, but it would be great if this could be optimised for the ebook.
The character of Motoki was probably my favourite part of the book, along with seeing the Melbourne landmarks I'm familiar with being mentioned throughout the story. I'm particularly interested in Arawn, he sounds like a complex personality that could be expanded further in later books. I can see how Gil would be a fan favourite, but he felt a bit one-dimensional to me, although he does seem very genuine and endearing. Unfortunately, I was not that interested in the pairing of Gil and Louisa, did not feel much chemistry or romantic tension between them.
The ending again, was quite rushed to me as I did not feel like the stakes were high enough (at the 70% mark on my Kindle I still don't know what/where the climax will be), but it did set up promising developments for future installments.
From the get go the first thing I've noticed is that this book is quite short for a fantasy. Having read several series of fantasy before, I am used to books being at least 500 pages long, but according to Storygraph (which is my main reading account), this book is only 252 pages long. I blazed through it quite fast as it is a nice and easy read. However, I couldn't help but feel that because of the short length of the book some of the character development and worldbuilding were rushed, especially in some of the first chapters where a lot of kings and queens characters were introduced. Another thing, which might also be remedied in the printed version (because I was reading on my Kindle) was that the world map was split in half. I loved me a map at the start of the book and managed to stitch together the two halves with a bit of graphic design, but it would be great if this could be optimised for the ebook.
The character of Motoki was probably my favourite part of the book, along with seeing the Melbourne landmarks I'm familiar with being mentioned throughout the story. I'm particularly interested in Arawn, he sounds like a complex personality that could be expanded further in later books. I can see how Gil would be a fan favourite, but he felt a bit one-dimensional to me, although he does seem very genuine and endearing. Unfortunately, I was not that interested in the pairing of Gil and Louisa, did not feel much chemistry or romantic tension between them.
The ending again, was quite rushed to me as I did not feel like the stakes were high enough (at the 70% mark on my Kindle I still don't know what/where the climax will be), but it did set up promising developments for future installments.