Tag: mythology

Review of A Flicker of Steel by Steve McHugh.

Over a short amount of time, I powered through Mr McHugh’s the last three books of Hellequin Chronicles and then straight on to the first book of The Avalon Chronicles. After reading A Glimmer of Hope and seeing that the second book was up for pre-order, I was extremely excited.

So I have finished A Flicker of Steel, and now want to read the next one… but I have to wait until November…

I guess I should start with this review. Where was I? Oh yes, A Flicker of Steel. FoS expanded a lot from the last one, it been two years since the previous book and is set after Scorched Shadows (So now I understand the timeline), we pick up with Layla as a full-time agent. As this expands what happened after the takeover (if you want to know more read Hellequin Chronicles) and catch up Tommy, Oliva, Cassy, Chloe and Harry.

Seeing how they have grown and have been dealing with this new status quo and how they all need desperately need a win. There is not much I can say about this book without spoiling the heck of it.

The growth of Layla from the first book to the end of this one was marvellous to watch. In the first one, she thought she was a monster like her father, in this one she has accepted that darkness exists within herself, but you don’t need to lose yourself.

The book is action-packed and fantastic.

And again my hat goes off to Elizabeth Knowelden’s narration as it allows the humour, excitement, emotion and characters come to life. Her skill to give the listener/reader the full picture from her use different tones, accents and pitch. Miss Knowelden is brilliant and brings the level of the book beyond five stars!

Just like Mr McHugh has written so far, every book builds on the previous books and finally this book it connected to the larger storyline. Which make me want to read the next book, to see what happens!

5 out of 5 stars! (With Miss Knowelden 10 out of 5 stars!)

 

5-star review of Hand and Talon by Melonie Purcell

I didn’t know what I was getting into when I grabbed this book for Rose Montague’s 12 days of Bookmas, but after being suck in after the first few pages, I was hooked!

Ms Purcell has marvellous creativity, her grasp of the lore she created for this book was fantastic! From the Callers to mages to the fae and most of all Kyrni, each was given a perfect amount of time to drip the information into your imagination.

I did also grab the audiobook, and the narrator Kristan James was spot on with her tone, pace and brilliant skill of bringing Melonie’s book to life.

This is a book to remember, and I might delve into it soon. Highly recommended!

Book Review for A Glimmer of Hope by Steve McHugh

Steve McHugh new series The Avalon Chronicles, A Glimmer of Hope. I grabbed the audiobook for this, and it was brilliant.

After finishing the Hellequin Chronicles, I didn’t want to leave this roller coaster of a fantastic and imaginative world Mr McHugh has created. I was glad that he wrote this series as it explored the new landscape from the previous book, Scorched Shadow.
I love it!

I love how there is a strong female protagonist by the name of Layla Cassidy, understanding her motivation and how that continues the whole mythology of Mr McHugh’s work was marvellous. I love the mythology and how Steve created it. I would highly recommend his book, but make sure you start at Crime of Magic first! I look forward to part two and three. 

5 out of 5 stars!

Premise and concept of my YA Story.

I have a quote “Remember once you have your dream, write it down!”, This story is where that quote comes from. One day before I went into Writers Activation’s writing drop-in centre, I had a dream, and that dream is going to become a series!

So the thought, most people know that I love fantasy but way before I started reading fantasy, I was reading non-fiction books like about dinosaurs and Greek History, mainly their mythology. I did branch to Norse Mythology as well. Since then I have had a fascination with this subject. In this dream, there were six youngsters, all with powers from the great archetypes of those legends. They still looked the same, but they gain the attributes of said ‘hero’.

When I arrive at the centre, I thought to myself, how did they gain this ability? What is the conflict? If they are hero archetype what are they? And who is the big bad? What drives this story? So on, you the usually questions you ask when you are writing a story. I stop and thought, at the time I was working on Lake Merrin and didn’t want another project, but I had a gut feeling that this was a good story with a compelling character as long as I took the time to fill them out.

So the basic premise of this ‘Story’ (I haven’t even thought of a title yet, so slack!). Six youths empowered with hero-like qualities, which are syphoned from the mirror reality of Mythology. How they gain the powers, was due to an experiment of the Big Bad Company who wish to tap into this infinite source of power and use it for ‘villainous’ deeds (Add evil laugh, mmmmmmwwwwahahhahhahahahaha)

So that is the basic premise, simple isn’t it? So now, let us move it from one dimensional to two. So this proposition says that in the past they gain powers somehow from an evil experiment. Now I ask myself at what age did they learn these skills and how old are they now?  Well I thought, they had to be young before puberty, so between 8 and 12 years old. The now is at least five years putting them at the end of High School. That fleshing it out a little bit more, so I say 1.25 dimensions.

Well, the ‘Big Bad’ is not evil, but greedy. They care about one thing, profit. During the time period, I have selected twenty-five wars was happening around the world. So this BB (short for you named it Big Bad), thought of a solution to profit in these wars. Making bigger guns, larger explosions, etc. is so old school. A scientist came across a pin prick hole into another dimension, was magic and myth come to life. But as always there is a catch, they are incorporeal. They can bond to a physical host if they are worthy but that is hard. So They found a way… Which leads us to the beginning of the story.

I think I have moved this to now, 2D. How can I make it a full three-dimensional story arc? Hmm. When was it set and where? Who are these children? A Little background on them? I think I could do that.

Well, I set it in the early 00’s when I was a teenager (dang I’m old) in Brisbane. Decent size city (for Australia), a range of cultures in the area I am thinking of. So the heroes, six in all, one Chinese-Australian, English Descent, Twins of Maltese Descent, Tongan and a Sudan Refugee. Each has the spark to attract a mythic archetype.

 Now I have fleshed out a bit more information, I think it is time for the first story. This is when the band become friends on the first day of school. Tune in next time for an unknown title of this series. Need to think of a name!