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The Prophecy of the Stones : A Novel

The Prophecy of the Stones : A Novel

List Price: $16.95
Your Price: $11.53
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Not Worth It
Review: After having read the mediocre Eragon, by another teenage writer, I was mildly interested to see how The Prophecy of the Stones compared, and I can't figure out why in the world any editor would think this a publishiable book if it had not been for the author's age. It's a good effort for a 13 year-old - but not something I'd read for pleasure.

There are many many flaws in this book - I will only mention a few here:

1.The Setting - This irritated me to no end. The world the story takes place in is incredibly vauge - I never got a sense of any kind of culture, climate, or geography that I'm used to finding in fantasy stories - I'm even confused about the time period. Jade is mentioned as having a watch, yet people use horses. What is up with this? And although one of the main issues of the book was about how the Council of Twelve oppressed people, I never saw much diffrence between it and Fairytale, which made the whole central plot uninteresting.

The Cliches - Come on, how cliched is calling someone the "Chosen One"? How about the "Army of Darkness" and "The Army of Light?" These and a few other things made me cringe.

The Frame Story - Completely unessessary, as well as confusing. How did Joa dream about Amber, Opal, and Jade? Are they just a dream? The ending of the frame story was way too cryptic and unsatisfying as well.

There are much better book to read, and I suggest you spend your time looking for them, rather than reading The Prophecy of the Stones.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: An Amazing Author
Review: Flavia Bujor, the author, is fifteen years old. She wrote this book over the course of six months while she was thirteen. This book was originally written in French, so they had to translate it before it came to America.
It is about three girls, Jade, Opal, and Amber, and their stones. They meet together and have wonderful, exciting, and voilent adventures. The end is very happy, I might add.
I liked this book because I think that Flavia Bujor is an amazing author, and she will be a well-accomplished author someday. She used very descriptive sentences and created beliavable characters.
Everyone should read it. If you like Dragon Rider or Chronicles of Narnia you should like The Prophecy of the Stones.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A beautiful, metaphorical world...
Review: I am thoroughly impressed by this book. When I intially heard about it, I assumed it was getting a great deal of press and becoming increasingly popular because of the novelty of having such a young author. I imagine this is partially true, however, the quality of the book allows it to stand on its own, without the hype of the media. Difficult to say what age group the book is appropriate for, but as an adult, I found it an interesting, thought provoking escape.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Amazing for a Teenager yet Lacking Originality
Review: I couldn't bear to read more than seven chapters of this book. I know it was written by a thirteen year old, but it reads as if the editor didn't actually check it for flaws. One problem I had was that even though the three girls are in what seems like a medieval time period, one of them has a watch! I also couldn't feel any sympathy for one of the main characters. All in all, I wish I hadn't wasted my money on this book.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: A good, if not spectacular, debut
Review: I found 'The Prophecy of the Stones' to be a fun read. It occasionally veers towards being shallow and superficial, though the concept was an interesting one - particularly the framing device, which I would have loved to have played a bigger part. The three girls, Jade, Amber, and Opal, were all interesting characters, with their personality traits corresponding to their individual gemstones, and there are a lot of nifty ideas within this novel. Worth reading, though I suspect it has lost something in the translation.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Cant wait to read this!
Review: I havn't read this book but i'm planning on it because I've heard generally good reviews about it and considering Bujor was only 12 when she wrote it makes me want to read it even more.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: *Sighs* You poor people.
Review: I just finished reading some of what you five star-ers had to say, and truthfully, you don't understand. Booger(yes, that was spelled that way on purpose.) has no talent whatsoever. Each character is introduced in a short, plain, blocky paragraph, with no background or anything. And to expect you are supposed to feel sorry for them.
Moving on, take a look at the place they live. Oh wait, where DO they live? obviously in some fake fantasy world, but there is no background there either! They talk like it's in the middle of the middle ages, but jade has a watch and other such things are out of place.
The romance was sloppy and unbelievable. They meet, all of a sudden *POOF!* they're in love. Even with love at first sight, it takes a little longer that that.
So many people give Booger a lot of credit becasue she wrote it when she was thirteen. Big deal. She should have waited. It is obvious she wrote POTS in such a short peroid of time because it SUCKS. The deeper meaning? All it does is preach about hope, and even that is horribly shallow.
They were too pretty, the three little pathetic heroines. They were too perfect, supposedly, and it started to make me sick. THey only use their stones, what, three times? What's the whole point of them anyway? The book could have gone on without them. Then there's the Nameless One named Nameless One. And the Council of Twelve with THIRTEEN members. And Death, thinking she's fat. That just made me want to puke. Who is Joa, and what is the whole point of having her in the story? Who cares if she dies? And did anyone else notice that J-O-A = Jade Opal Amber? THE POINT PLEASE??? All in all, the book is choppy, without any flow. I have read SO MANY fantasy books. A TON. This is the worst book I have ever read. And I'm not kidding. POTS is just not in the same league, and shouldn't be even considered an equal or better to The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, or Eragon. And that is my humble opinion.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Much Hype and Little Substance
Review: I suspect a lot may have been lost in the translation because I cannot see what all the hype was about. True, this is a completed publication by a teen, but I can tell the book was written by a teen. The writing style is immature, and the story does not flow. I wish I read French so that I could see how this translation compares. This is NOT a good book for adult readers. I had a hard time finishing it. However, my pre-teen Godchild enjoyed it.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Not even worth one star!
Review: I wouldn't call this a horrible book, but it isn't exactly a great one either. I thought some of her ideas were a bit weak. She should have thought of a nice name for her fantasy world instead of "Fairytale". I didn't think her characters had enough character. At the end of the book I felt like I didn't know enough about the characters. She didn't have very much description about any of the places which kind of left me to making up everything by myself. A reader shouldn't have to do that, everything should already be set up so you really only have to do a little imagining. The story was about three girls, but there was also two other stories that were connected to it. I found the part about The Chosen One more interesting than the story of the girls.

Flavia also used that "Love at first sight" thing twice. The way she approached it was kind of funny. Her whole idea about Death was interesting but overall I have enjoyed a lot of books MORE than I have this one. I love writing myself and after I read this I kind of felt like just ANYONE can write. When that isn't exactly true. I am a really fast reader and I've read a 300 page book in a day and a half before. This book, took me a week. I could put it down at any time with out really dying out of curiosity to know what happens next. I wouldn't really recommend this book to anyone. Some people may like it, but I thought it could have been a LOT better than it was.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Interesting and Original
Review: In The Prophecy of the Stones, the only thing that threw me off was the beginning. It was a little slow. But after that it got better. Since she wrote it when she was 13, she deserves some credit for it. I think it definitely gets a four star rating, five if not for the beginning.


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