Devlin’s boredom
I have just finished Patricia Bray’s trilogy, The Sword of Choice, including Devlin’s Luck, Devlin’s Honor, and Devlin’s Justice, and I found it incredibly poor, especially when compared with another (later) trilogy from the same author, The Chronicles of Josan, which was a pleasant read.
Devlin’s trilogy, on the other hand, is appaling. While the overall plot is ok, the story is poorly told, the characters are inconsistent and even the central character, Devlin, remains poorly defined till the end of the third volume. The rendering of the King is even worse, with no clue about his motivations and his sudden change of behaviour. There is not subtelty and very little surprise in the subplots: they start at a given point and we are sure to see them completed a few chapters after. The underlying thread that an unknown enemy plots against the local kingdom runs across the three volumes but there is no logical explanation on why this enemy picked on Devlin in particular.
At last, I find the morals of the book rather untasty in that the killings of hostages, including children, and of wounded enemies and allies, as well as torture, are all justified against the greater good (of getting a magical sword or of liberating the country). This is so first-degree that there is no way to sympathise with it.
April 11, 2009 at 12:44 pm
[…] Despite raving reviews on Amazon, I cannot see any depth or appeal in this series. Given that I am more and more disgruntled with fantasy books, this may be a sign of getting old or simply a statistical […]
October 6, 2008 at 8:44 pm
En français sil te plaît !