Elitist Book Reviews

Being a book critic is sort of like getting to experience Christmas at least once a week. Getting books from your favorite authors months before release is the gift that keeps on giving. Earlier this year I read GREATSHADOW by James Maxey, and despite my cynical reservations it blew me away. Now we have HUSH, the much anticipated sequel that I had to wait excruciating months for. Months! With great excitement I started reading about the most original and colorful fantasy world I have encountered in recent memory.

HUSH picks up almost immediately after the events of GREATSHADOW. If you haven't read GREATSHADOW please stop with this review and go buy it. Otherwise you may encounter some spoilers, though I will try to keep those to a minimum.

The great and mighty Infidel, minus her vaunted invulnerability and super strength, is determined to fulfill an oath made to friend, the late ice-ogress shaman Aurora. Infidel seeks to return a sacred relic to Aurora's people up North. Along the way Infidel blunders into a conspiracy to kill Glorious, the elemental dragon of the Sun and bring an unending ice-age to the world. Can Infidel defeat this insidious plot?

You may recall that I was unenthusiastic to begin reading GREATSHADOW. I quit reading fantasy in the first place because of dragons and magical quests and the like. It was only the new wave of gritty, ultra-dark Sword & Sorcery fantasy that brought me back to the genre. Ironically enough, as much as I love the works of Abercrombie and Martin, GREATSHADOW proved to be a welcome diversion from all the backstabbing and plotting. HUSH is no different in this regard, though perhaps the luster may have worn off a little.

The most striking thing about Maxey's Dragon Apocalypse series is the world he has created. GREATSHADOW was set solely on the Isle of Fire but HUSH expands on this, taking us across the Sea of Wine and up to the icy North. This is a world where magic is the rule rather than the exception. And you won't just find one kind of magic either. There are layers upon layers of different belief system driven magic. Everyone appears to have a super power of some sort or another. The half-seeds are particularly cool - humans bonded with animals through blood magic to create a sort of hybrid. There is a fair amount of philosophical introspection, musing on the nature of magic in a world where myth overpowers reality. HUSH is absolutely loaded with ideas and that may just be a hindrance as well as a selling point.

For the most part all of these conflicting viewpoints and magic systems mesh surprisingly well, but the overabundance can lead to shellshock. The Silver Isles are exotic and dangerous. I love that this is a fantasy novel in an island setting with a heavy dose of pirate swagger but sometimes Maxey seems to just make up the rules as he goes along.

The cast this time around is also noticeably weaker than that of GREATSHADOW. We are once more joined by the ghost of Stagger, impotent observer of doom. Stagger plays a much bigger role this time around and I would even hazard to say that he is the main protagonist as opposed to Infidel. I liked watching Stagger develop but I feel like he faced far too many death defying scenarios for an already dead guy. Then of course we have Infidel, lacking in super strength and invulnerability but armed with the Immaculate Attire and a hammer made of solid sunlight. I didn't enjoy Infidel as much this time around. She had room to grow as a character but failed to do so. Without her super powers she happens to get knocked out quite a lot. Joining our two lead characters is a crippled witch by the name of Sorrow. Sorrow will be taking the lead in the third book of the series, WITCHBREAKER, and I have high hopes for her. Sorrow is a materialist weaver with the ability to manipulate the very particles of matter. Then there is the Romer family...

To make the journey North, Infidel hires the notorious Wanderer ship the Freewind. This is a vessel crewed by a family with magical powers. The captain has a mastery over the wind. She has a son who can run on water and swim through air. There is a son who can control ropes with his mind. A third son is partially shark. There is a daughter who can control a person's taste buds and another daughter who can see unseeable things through a spyglass. Oh yeah, there is also a girl who can impart her inertia upon other people with only a touch but she appears only briefly at the beginning and then sort of vanishes never to return...I liked the Romer family, but I think they were sadly underdeveloped. Perhaps we will see them again in WITCHBREAKER as there are some minor plot threats involving the family that need tying up.

Perhaps my greatest problem with HUSH is that I had set my expectations too high. With GREATSHADOW my expectations couldn't have been any lower and that allowed Maxey to surprise and captivate me immensely. HUSH didn't have this same luxury, instead having to meet my ridiculous standards. Maxey has talent and just as importantly (and even more rare) is that he can generate truly novel ideas. As a sequel HUSH expands upon the world introduced in the first book, even if it doesn't match up in terms of quality. I still had a good time reading this novel, and fully intend to read and review WITCHBREAKER when it is released.

Recommended Age: 14+
Language: I can't actually remember there being any foul language this time.
Violence: Dynamic fights stripped from the pages of a comic book it would seem, with the addition of some grisly deaths.
Sex: Hinted at but nothing more.

Want it? Here are you links to the whole series thus far:
GREATSHADOW
HUSH.

Reviewing books has its ups and downs. On one hand you are given free books to read and asked to give your opinion of them. Reading and stating my opinion are serious hobbies of mine. On the other hand, sometimes you are asked to read books about dragons. Dragons. I do not like dragons. I have not enjoyed reading about dragons for a long, long time. You'll imagine my surprise then, when I completely fell in love with James Maxey's GREATSHADOW.

The elements have been tamed by dragons. Through powerful magic the dragons of bound themselves to nature. Of these dragons Greatshadow is feared most of all. As the primal dragon of fire, Greatshadow's merciless influence is universal. In order to finally slay Greatshadow once and for all the Church of the Book assembles a team of mercenaries and adventurers unlike any other. A team so unorthodox it might be able to get the job done.

Dragons. Groan. Magic. Yawn. Mercenaries. Curse you conventions of fantasy! But then I start to read GREATSHADOW and I realize that it is far from a traditional adventure. The world the story takes place in is not some pseudo-Medieval Europe. Instead readers are introduced to the Isle of Fire, a lawless volcanic tropical paradise replete with ancient history. Maxey gives tantalizing glimpses of a wider world across the ocean but focuses primarily on the verdant wonderland that is the Isle of Fire. This sort of pirate-aesthetic goes a long way toward separating GREATSHADOW from the endless masses of Tolkien knockoffs. The inhabitants of this world range from pygmies to ogres and all manner of fantasy creatures. Most surprisingly of all is just how cool Maxey's take on dragons is. Multiple magic systems are also present and though they are only vaguely defined they all operate within the constraints of fictional universe.

And the characters! The eccentric band of adventurers that set out to slay Greatshadow resemble exactly the sort of team of heroes a kid might gather from his favorite action figures. The cast is really an accumulation of superheroes plucked from comics and plopped down in this fantasy setting where they flourish. Under a lesser author this approach would be really cheesy but rather than being campy it comes across as endearing. There is a woman who is nearly impervious to damage, a holy knight who is protected by armor prayed into existence and wields a hammer that allows him to fly, an ice-ogress shaman, a cleric whose magic comes from truth, a heretic whose magic comes from deception, a shape shifter, a faceless man, a man with skunk genetics, and more.

Despite the relatively short length of the novel for such an epic quest, character development does not suffer. Though Maxey doesn't go into intense detail with each individual character he does make it evident what their motivations and relationships are. Each character is propelled by something different and each character has their own set of flaws. Perhaps my favorite character would be Lord Tower, the holy knight with conflicting feelings of lust and shame. I also really liked the cleric, who despite his intolerant nature, remained a true follower of his faith. And faith really becomes a big part of the relationship dynamic amongst the characters. Each person has their own beliefs and ideologies to go along with their motivations. Many of these faiths clash, creating an unstable alliance amongst the adventurers. Maxey never tells which belief is correct and it's easy to wonder if perhaps all of them have their own merit.

GREATSHADOW is told from a limited first person perspective that is really a sort of third person perspective at the same time. Stagger, the narrator, is not the main character of the novel. Instead he dies in the first chapter and follows around Infidel, the lead protagonist and his heart's desire, for most of the story. As a blood-ghost Stagger is primarily an observer but he also occasionally has the ability to act over the course of the story. I found this distinctive PoV style to be very compelling, especially when it comes to developing a bond with Infidel and the world as a whole.

GREATSHADOW is a remarkably charming quest, set in an invigorating new world. As the opening to a series, GREATSHADOW succeeds at grabbing the heart and piquing the interest for future entries.


Recommended Age: 14+
Language: Present but minimal.
Violence: Very comic-like in nature but there are a few grisly deaths.
Sex: There is a bit of innuendo and one actual scene that is described with class.

Pick this one up!
GREATSHADOW