A review by mackle13
Alchemystic by Anton Strout
1.0
1.5
There's a little part of me - a very little part - that sort of wants to bump this up to 2 stars. This is down to two things: 1) I did sort of care about Stanis but the end of the book. (He's the gargoyle. He's also the only character with any real development.) 2) I still have a hard time using 1-stars for "didn't like" instead of "absolutely abysmal".
'Cause this book isn't abysmal... but it was pretty bad, and I did not like.
The story was pretty standard UF fare, the biggest difference being that the supernatural creature dujoir is a gargoyle instead of the more usual - and, really, that's mostly why I gave this book a chance. I blame my childhood love for the cartoon 'Gargoyles' (which is referenced in the story).
But this gargoyle doesn't turn to flesh, he's always stone - and, no, it's never explained how stone can fly. As my husband says for these occasions, "A wizard did it."
But it's not the predictability of the story which is the problem. It's the characters and the writing.
The first problems with the writing crop up pretty much immediately when we meet the characters, and are given horribly clunky chunks of expositionary dialogue. Here's a slightly hyperbolic example:
"Hello Aurora, my best friend. How are you, you fierce, wee thing, you?"
"Well, Lexi, as you know I am doing an intensive dance program and some other school stuff, and am panic prone to begin with."
"I know this is very true, my best friend Rory - which is what I usually call you."
Yes, it really is that bad.
And the characters are all pretty one-dimensional with their particular things which, of course, become relevant and useful in the story.
Lexi is a wanna-be artist, even though her family is in real estate and kinda want her to be in real estate, too. Of course, when shit goes down, it's her artistic side which becomes important - as one might guess from the whole Spellmason thing.
Rory, as stated, is a dancer and, apparently, this gives her mad fighting skills 'cause, ya know, fighting and dancing are totally the same, yo. (As someone who's done both - no. Just no.)
(She's also completely spastic. One page she's telling Lexi that maybe she shouldn't mess around with the magic 'cause she doesn't know what dangers it could have, and in the next page she's asking why Lexi hasn't been busy making a gargoyle army.)
And Marshall is a D&D geek, who can't say ANYTHING without it being a game reference (which would make slightly more sense if anyone else in the story was slightly into gaming, 'cause then it could be funny in-jokes, but, no, he's just a socially awkward loser who has no point of reference outside of D&D 'cause, ya know, gamers are losers and all). BUT his game knowledge comes in totally useful because he knows what things like alchemy are, and he can instantly memorize the layout of a building from all those years of campaigning.
'Cause, yeah...
Oh, and the parents are the typical emotionally distant and pressurey sort who can't understand why their daughter wants to be her own person instead of following the family business. (But this all works out conveniently in the end, so it's all good.)
And, ya know, I'm glad I wrote this review 'cause I totally remember why I one-starred it.
As I said, there is a saving grace in Stanis, who actually develops a bit through the story (and is the reason for that little half star) - but there are issues with this, too.
For one, he's sort of forced to change as Lexi takes it upon herself to give him back his memories, despite being warned how bad this could be. so he's mostly given back his character more than developing one.
And there are a whole host of other issues, like Lexi never considering that a living piece of stone might have feelings, or ever considering the moral implications of having, essentially, a magically bound slave.
So, yeah...
This is just really badly written. I boggle at the many rave reviews but, then, I'm a weirdo, so there's that.
There's a little part of me - a very little part - that sort of wants to bump this up to 2 stars. This is down to two things: 1) I did sort of care about Stanis but the end of the book. (He's the gargoyle. He's also the only character with any real development.) 2) I still have a hard time using 1-stars for "didn't like" instead of "absolutely abysmal".
'Cause this book isn't abysmal... but it was pretty bad, and I did not like.
The story was pretty standard UF fare, the biggest difference being that the supernatural creature dujoir is a gargoyle instead of the more usual - and, really, that's mostly why I gave this book a chance. I blame my childhood love for the cartoon 'Gargoyles' (which is referenced in the story).
But this gargoyle doesn't turn to flesh, he's always stone - and, no, it's never explained how stone can fly. As my husband says for these occasions, "A wizard did it."
But it's not the predictability of the story which is the problem. It's the characters and the writing.
The first problems with the writing crop up pretty much immediately when we meet the characters, and are given horribly clunky chunks of expositionary dialogue. Here's a slightly hyperbolic example:
"Hello Aurora, my best friend. How are you, you fierce, wee thing, you?"
"Well, Lexi, as you know I am doing an intensive dance program and some other school stuff, and am panic prone to begin with."
"I know this is very true, my best friend Rory - which is what I usually call you."
Yes, it really is that bad.
And the characters are all pretty one-dimensional with their particular things which, of course, become relevant and useful in the story.
Lexi is a wanna-be artist, even though her family is in real estate and kinda want her to be in real estate, too. Of course, when shit goes down, it's her artistic side which becomes important - as one might guess from the whole Spellmason thing.
Rory, as stated, is a dancer and, apparently, this gives her mad fighting skills 'cause, ya know, fighting and dancing are totally the same, yo. (As someone who's done both - no. Just no.)
(She's also completely spastic. One page she's telling Lexi that maybe she shouldn't mess around with the magic 'cause she doesn't know what dangers it could have, and in the next page she's asking why Lexi hasn't been busy making a gargoyle army.)
And Marshall is a D&D geek, who can't say ANYTHING without it being a game reference (which would make slightly more sense if anyone else in the story was slightly into gaming, 'cause then it could be funny in-jokes, but, no, he's just a socially awkward loser who has no point of reference outside of D&D 'cause, ya know, gamers are losers and all). BUT his game knowledge comes in totally useful because he knows what things like alchemy are, and he can instantly memorize the layout of a building from all those years of campaigning.
'Cause, yeah...
Oh, and the parents are the typical emotionally distant and pressurey sort who can't understand why their daughter wants to be her own person instead of following the family business. (But this all works out conveniently in the end, so it's all good.)
And, ya know, I'm glad I wrote this review 'cause I totally remember why I one-starred it.
As I said, there is a saving grace in Stanis, who actually develops a bit through the story (and is the reason for that little half star) - but there are issues with this, too.
For one, he's sort of forced to change as Lexi takes it upon herself to give him back his memories, despite being warned how bad this could be. so he's mostly given back his character more than developing one.
And there are a whole host of other issues, like Lexi never considering that a living piece of stone might have feelings, or ever considering the moral implications of having, essentially, a magically bound slave.
So, yeah...
This is just really badly written. I boggle at the many rave reviews but, then, I'm a weirdo, so there's that.