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Summary: The Bone Doll's Twin written by Lynn Flewelling
Review: This is the best book I have read in a very long time. If you like a story that includes witches, wizards and wizardry, ghosts, family history and tales of the past you will love this book. There is something for everyone. A mothers love, compassion, duels, war and true friendship, jealosy and the true right to the throne are what you will find in this story.This being my first real fantasy that I have read took me a little rereading to get the cast of characters straight. The story in itself was so exciting that I could not put it down. I could not wait to see what magical power or apparition would show next. I feel this is a winner and I am glad that I have read this as my first fantasy. It will spoil me for all others. I have also started the sequel Hidden Warrior and look forward to reading Ms Flewellings previous writings. Hats off to Lynn Flewelling!! I applaud thee.
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Summary: Royal Blood
Review: This wonderful novel is one of a very few that I was unable to put down for more than a few moments at a time. Lynn Flewelling's writing style is matched only by her plot line and I can honestly say that reading The Bone Doll's Twin was sheer pleasure. Not only was the plot well conceived but her characterization is also definitive and believable. Readers will be swept up into the tumultuous world of Skala, finding themselves completely inured to the journey of this seemingly ill-fated duo. By the end of the book, you will hunger even more greatly for the next novel that follows entitled Hidden Warrior, which I have not had the fortune to read yet.
If you like this book and are interested in the work of more female authors, I suggest reading Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier and Rhapsody by Elizabeth Haydon. All of the aforementioned books do, however, have sequels, so if you want the story finished in just one book, I'm afraid you're just out of luck with these three great novels.
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Summary: Where to begin?
Review: I bought this book because it came with an incredibly high rating, and had several reviews (including one by one of my favorite authors, Robin Hobb) that were well-written, coherent pieces of praise. Which leaves me with one questinon: Which book were they reading, and could they please loan me a copy? What I got was several hundred pages of...nothing. Nothing punctuated with random, gratuitous, pornographic sex. The story was interesting in concept, but poorly executed. There were no sympathetic characters, and little action. I'm ashamed to say I hung on until page 330-something, thinking that surely it got better. Perhaps the sequels improved it; I'll never know. All in all, I've read better and more interesting Star Trek spin-offs than this uninteresting if "original" book. If there was a zero-star rating, this book would've earned it. Now where's that used book store?
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Summary: I can't believe I waited so long to read this!
Review: Throughout Skala's history a line of warrior queens have protected the land but when King Erius usurped his sister's throne, plague and drought overran the land. The only way to change this is to restore the female line to the throne. However, finding a new queen of royal blood is no easy task since every female who has even a distant claim to the throne is murdered. That all changes when Ariani, the King's sister, gives birth to twins; a boy and a girl. The boy twin is murdered so that, through dark magic, the girl can take his form. Consequently, young Tobin grows up, unaware of his true identity and perpetually haunted by the ghost of his murdered brother. Very interesting fantasy that borders on dark fantasy. I loved Lynn Flewelling's Nightrunner series so I ran out and bought this one as soon as it came out. Then I stupidly let this gem of a book sit on my bookshelf for two years. Normally when a character in a fantasy novel is a child I'm bored to tears until they grow up but that wasn't the case with Tobin. I adored him and a lot of the other characters, although not quite as much as the Nightruner characters. However, I do think this book is a much more fluid read than the Nightrunner books. Anyway, this book is highly recommended even if you haven't read any of the author's previous work.
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Summary: Fiction That Literally Cuts to the Bone
Review: I practically read this book from cover to cover in one sitting. It is an awesome story with depth, characters and clear writing. If you love good fantasy with a twist of darkness, this is the one. Young Tobin is living a lie, for the Prince is in reality a Princess, disguised through magic at birth through the death of her twin brother to protect her until she comes of age to claim her rightful throne. But first, Tobin must survive a harrowing childhood filled with deception, from the insanity of his poor mother to the wicked threat of exposure through the Harrier Mages (who are seeking to unite all mages under their thumb, and executing those who refuse to join them...). Non-stop action, wonderful characters, dialogue and intricate scenery all make this a meaty read. It's not one you can put down easily. I personally am impatient for the next installment, and hope I won't have long to wait. A great book for winter night...
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Summary: I read this in two days!!
Review: And believe me I got upset if anyone interrupted me! I even took it to work and read a few chapters there! This book was very well written and the characters grab you. I am going to find the sequel to this today and order it. By the way, Im wondering what book the other reviewer was reading that had pornographic sex scenes? Sounds like a different book altogether, the only characters having sex were the wizard and the witch and i don't think they got to deeply into that. Great read.
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Summary: How to slog through mud, AkA where's the beef?
Review: I wish that I had more positive things to say. It takes the main character too long to do anything. If you had gotten rid of all of the moaning and groaning over growing up and gotten to the meat of the matter I would have enjoyed the book more. I enjoy female protagonists usually but this book drags. All you hear over and over is that the child's mother went insane, the father boo-hoos over it and the child is left to deal with the angry twin. Where is the action, where is the magic, who cares about the supporting characters especially if they don't seem to do more than hide, smell bad, and talk rather badly? I wouldn't recommend this book, in fact if you cut out the growing up verbiage of the child I bet you could get the entire trilogy in one book.
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Summary: Slow, but a good read overall
Review: As a whole, I saw this book-to paint a picture-as like a barbell... It's heavy at the beginning, kind of long and mild in the middle, then it gets heavy again at the end. The beginning of the story pulls you in for sure; then, as you get into the story, it just turns into one long story. There are a lot of important elements in the middle of the story that are needed to understand the beginning and the end, so it's kind of justifiable, but I felt that the author needed to pick up the pace in certain instances and leave other things out. Overall, this is a good read. The story and characters do pull you in and, I feel, makes you want to finish the book. There are quite a few books that I could not finish because I just could not get into them; but this one kept me. The ending of the story truly makes me want to read the second novel. I'm really interested to see how things turned out for the main character and the other characters as well.
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Summary: Dark and creepy
Review: I had never read any of Flewelling's books before and picked this book up at the bookstore at random. It is everything the book jacket says it is, dark, creepy and engrossing. I usually don't enjoy the macabre aspects of fantasy, but the writing is so entertaining that I couldn't put it down. I highly recommend it!
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Summary: Intriguing, but a bit stale.
Review: I read this book because I am absolutely in love with Flewelling's earlier series, Nightrunner. This book is a prequel of sorts, highlighting the life of one of the warrior queens of Skala, and the prospect of filling in a bit of Skala's already rich history seemed more than worth my reading time. The writing, is as always, very good, with the quality of voice that make you think Flewelling has been in the forests and travelled the roads she describes. There are some images that I still find stuck in my head, even after reading this book only once. And there is a lot in this one installment; we're taken from Skala's capitol, to the holdings in the woods, and to the mountains to visit an Oracle. And all the places have a texture that makes them easy to see and grasp and hold onto. After the initial action, the birth and early, early childhood of the main character, which is slightly terrifying, the book got -- I hate to say it -- boring. With a few exceptions, I didn't care. Tobin didn't seem to have a personality so much as personality traits, and he's the main character. Imagine how the rest of the cast fared. The thing I loved about Flewelling's other books was that she stuck to her plot, and if she failed to do so, I was disappointed. However, this trilogy seems to be taking the opposite extreme, and is just about the story. The characters, their relationships, smaller, cultural, or personal events are of no consequence. And that's what makes writing rich. After I finished the first book of the Nightrunner series, I couldn't get my mind off of it, I needed to have the second one...With The Bone Doll's Twin, I just sort of closed the book, tossed it off to the side, picked up something else. I didn't notice when the second book came out at all; my mom picked it up for me. If you are looking for a well-written, compelling fantasy novel, or if you loved Nightrunner to death and are interested in the Skala backstory, you should pick this up. Just be aware that you'll be fighting to love the characters, and you'll be fighting to care about what happens.
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