Rating: 
Summary: Dumfounded
Review: I don't know what to say that other reviewers have not all ready said. All I can say is, this has to be my
book
of
the
century.
Rating:
Summary: A new favorite
Review: For the last few years I have mostly stuck to reading my same favorite fantasy authors over and over again, just because I couldn't find anything else decent. Tolkien, Le Guin, etc seemed to be the only ones to write with brain and soul. Now here comes Dart-Thornton and if her next books are going to be anything like The Ill-Made Mute she's now on my list of favorites to read over and over again. Impressive! Enthralling! Slow to start, but once you get into it, unputdownable!
Rating:
Summary: The reviewers say classic and they're right
Review: I read a review of The Ill-Made Mute in The Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy. If you have any doubts about how good it is and what a classic it's going to be, listen to this: "The Celtic twilight utterly other world created here is so rich and strange, it has to go on. And it might well go on to become - the potential is manifest - one of the great fantasies." This review made me go out and buy the book and I was thrilled with it. Then I checked out a couple websites and saw that scifi.com, mysterious galaxies and sciencefiction.com all give rave reviews of the book. So does futurefiction.com. So the word is getting around! Buy it. Read it. You'll see what I mean.
Rating:
Summary: Give me a little romance any time...
Review: Thorn would have to be the most gorgeous hero I've ever read about. I am getting Thorn-withdrawal-symptoms right now. If I can't get Book 2 pretty soon I shall expire ! Yes I know The Ill-Made Mute is about the supernatural worlds etc. but the romantic relationships is like the spice on the cake. I always prefer books with some romance in the pages, and this is the BEST. Bring on the REST!
Rating:
Summary: I like the characters
Review: The characters in The Ill-Made Mute are very good. The people have lots of emotions that are like real people. When ever anything was happening to Imrhien I was feeling the same way. I could tell what kind of person she was. She's very likeable, loyal and sympathetic. I was so glad when a good thing came to her in the end. I hope she wins her true love in the second book of the series. Thorn was very good too. I think many people would love to meet him if he was real! Sianadh was a helpful man but in some ways a hindrance but I liked him a lot and he was good to Imrhien. I was sad when he died. I want to see what happens next to Imrhein.
Rating:
Summary: Creature-fest!
Review: What I love about this book is the way it is different. It is SOOO refreshing to at last hove something that's not the usual elves, dwarfs and dragons. Not just a re-hash of Tolkien, who can't be copied anyway.
Far from being stale fantasy it is fresh and alive with amazing creatures I had not known about before. Now I find out they've been around for hundreds of year, in folklore. These creatures are cool. They are all different sort. Some are very dangerous, others are kind, and others play tricks. They live all over the place and you can never be sure if one is going to suddenly pop out from somewhere.
Can't wait to read the next book in the series.
Rating:
Summary: A real nother world
Review: I have never read a book with better descriptions than The Ill Made Mute. The descrittions take you into another world. That's what I want when I read a fantasy book. I want too feel that I have escape the real world for a while. Even more these days I think we all need a break from what's going on. Reading the Ill-Made Mute made me feel I was somewhere else. That whole other world came alive becuse of the detailed descriptions. There seems to be nothing the author has not found out about, to make the story more realistic and satisfying
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful language
Review: The language is beautiful. There are none of the clichés we have come to expect from modern fantasy writing. IN fact this is very different from a lot of modern fantasy writing. The research is as thorough as I've ever seen and the language in places reminds me of Shakespeare. Yet all the words used fit in perfectly well, and are so apt. I was able to enjoy broadening my vocabulary while at the same time immersing myself in thew best read I've had since I first clapped eyes on The Lord of the Rings. Wish I could give this book more stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Avoid at all costs
Review: I bought this book on the strength of the jacket blurbs and other reviews. Lots of people highly recommend it. So I was amazed at just how BAD it actually was! The descriptive passages are so flowery and over the top (eg; clouds looking like 'tesselated teasle-tufts') that they are quite nauseating and serve to seriously undermine the credibility of the storyline. Furthermore there is, for the most part, only one main protagonist in the story - and she is both mute and suffering from amnesia! Needless to say this makes character development rather difficult. I was quite unable to empathise with the plight of Imrhien and thus the book failed to develop any sense of dramatic tension for me. All in all I thought it was an absolute shocker! Don't bother with this one! Really it should get NO STARS
Rating: 
Summary: Personal problems in an age where heroism is called for
Review: Mute, disfigured, and without a memory, Imrhien dreams of escape from her job as a drudge in a huge castle on a fantasy world. When she does escape, things go from bad to worse as she is cast into adventure seeking wealth and recovery of her face, voice, and memory. Author Cecilia Dart-Thornton has created a promising world where our childhood fairy tales are (often horribly) real and the unseelie armies gather to destroy humankind. Yet, in such a world, can we really care about whether one person recovers her face? I have high hopes that the world-building that is so capably performed in THE ILL-MAEE MUTE can be matched by plot-building and character-building in future volumes in this series.
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