Temptress of the Flame by Wade KakoschkeMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Not too bad!
The story was a little weak in places but overall it was a fun story that kept me interested.
The plot sees Plainsward Halius finding himself entangled in the quest of Firemage Zebala after leaving his village to find a cure for the mysterious illness ravaging his people. Meanwhile, his brother Valus finds himself imprisoned by the tyrant Fire Lord, Gyanos.
Firstly, I found the initial union of Halius and Zebala to be a bit grating. The logic of the two joining forces seemed a little too weak to me, since noble Halius was originally on the quest to save his people. After he joined Zeb, it was like he kind of forgot that everyone back home was dying. So I wasn't real sold on it, but I did like Zeb's immediate feistiness.
The relationship between the two never really did a lot for me, which was a shame because I really felt that would have made for so much more impact from later events. I think there just wasn't a lot of character growth, and there wasn't enough demonstration of the characters' traits. For example, Halius is supposed to be this hero of his people - he's the friendly giant who is huge and tough but goes out of his way to help others. There were a few moments where he did demonstrate this need to protect others, but they were so often tied to idiocy that Halius to me just ended up being a dim-witted oaf of a character. Therefore, he seemed more like the idiot muscle sidekick stereotype to me than the hero he was supposed to be.
Zebala, to her credit, basically stayed vicious and mean and definitely ridiculously powerful but just not interested in helping anyone but herself. I think we were supposed to witness this side of her softening, but I just never felt that. I suspect that this story just had too much telling and not enough feeling. Like, I could read about her doing something really impressively powerful, and how it made people around her react, but I never emotionally connected to it myself. I think maybe the context wasn't fleshed out enough - the stakes weren't clear enough to get me invested.
I suppose my biggest criticism is just that the story seemed to flow too conveniently. There were still unpredictable moments and surprises for me, but ultimately I knew that if they talked about how much they definitely didn't want to go to a certain place, they'd inevitably end up there almost immediately. I think this also contributed to me feeling emotionally detached from the story - it's like I could see the author moving the pieces, rather than falling into the story and being amongst these characters.
Even with all that, though, I really enjoyed the journey of this story. At first I thought it might seem a little slow and pointlessly long, but I did really end up enjoying all the twists and turns and wonderful creatures that appeared along the way, even if it was hard to picture some of them.
There are some fantastic battle scenes, but there's also some vividly brutal violence that seemed a bit overdone to me. The 'healing' aspect seemed a convenient trick to allow for the most gruesome forms of torture the author could invent, and I think it all just went a bit too far for me. Especially when these characters lived to see another day. I don't think it needed to be quite this savage for us to feel the impact it had on the characters involved, and in my case it actually had the opposite effect - it was so absurdly gory that I just couldn't comprehend the character as real and actually experiencing that. Particularly since there was evidently no lasting trauma.
I really loved Elath, and enjoyed how the relationship between he and Valus developed. I think Elath had the best character development of the entire story, and he was easily the one I appreciated the most. He was a character I was able to connect to, understand, and feel for. So the dungeon scenes were easily some of my favourites.
Meanwhile, whatever the fk that was with Siara was just a complete mess.
I did enjoy having the two separate story lines, and particularly enjoyed their inevitable collision. It was nice to have a break from each story line now and again.
Overall, I enjoyed the journey but it did ultimately seem a little weak in its point. But there are some fantastic creatures and Elath in particular is an endearing character that you can really root for, so it was still a fun read for me.
I do feel that others less critical of fantasy will enjoy this more than I, as there is plenty to keep you reading on. It's not a perfect work of art, but it is an enjoyable romp in a fantasy world that will still throw some surprises at you.
With thanks to the author for a copy to read and review
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