Song of Edmon Adam Burch 2 of 5 stars |
First Sentence "My father strides into the island manse the day I am born." |
Publisher's Description: The isolated planet of Tao is a house divided: the peaceful Daysiders live in harmony while the pale Nightsiders pursue power and racial purity through the violent ritual of the Combat.
Edmon Leontes, the gentle son of a ruthless warrior noble and a proud Daysider, embodies Tao's split nature. The product of diametrically opposed races, Edmon hopes to live a quiet life pursuing the music of his mother's people, but his Nightsider father cruelly forces him to continue in his bloody footsteps to ensure his legacy.
Edmon's defiance will cost him everything...and spark a revolution that will shake the foundations of Tao. His choice - to embrace the light or surrender to the darkness - will shape his own fate and that of his divided world.. |
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Dear Reader, I struggled through this book. It was almost badly written enough for me to give up on it. The saving grace was the world that the author created. I happen to be fond of dystopian settings, and so I hung in there. Burch, in his literary debut creates a post apocalyptic version of earth that now has a permanent night-side and a days-side. Night siders are all blond and fair-skinned and day-siders have black hair and bronzed skin. This earth-like planet also near a rift in space that allows interstellar travel called "The Fracture." There's advanced technology ( aquagraphic tv screens, sonic-flying-blimps called "Sondi") and magical creatures like leviathans and sirens. The writing is something I'd expect of an advanced high-schooler. The titular main character, Edmon, is cheesy and dramatic and changes what he's about and how determined he is throughout the plot. Quotes like, " I'm a shadow of the boy I used to be." and a non-ending finale to this book is described vaguely. There's a lot of strife in this main character's life and it's all beyond the readers limits of believable which leads me to roll my eyes at the next awful thing that happens to Edmon (oh no his mom is beaten publicly! oh no! Edmon gets taken to an awful-fight-club-boys-school! oh no Edmon is now sentenced to life in a Rura-Penthe-esque prison with prison-sex! etc I don't want to be too spoiler-y but things keep getting worse for him.) The character development just doesn't happen. The characters are very one dimensional or they suddenly change to be something that isn't realistic to any humanoid personality. The motivations of one of the main villains's Edmon's father, Edric, never really make sense or stay the same throughout the book. It made me angry but I kept angrily reading to see how silly the resolution of the plot would be. Two stars is the lowest rating I can give to a book I actually made it all the way through. I give the author credit for the time and work he put into it; but it's really not worth reading. This is book one of a series. I won't be reading any more of this awkward narrative. Yours, Marsha |
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