Blog Tour: Arrow of the Mist by Christine Mercer

Posted July 12, 2013 by Lola in Fantasy, Review / 8 Comments


Today I am part of the Arrow of the Mist blog tour by Christina Mercer. First I share my review with you, then there is some information about the author and there is a giveaway to win an e-copy of this book. A;sp check out the complete tour schedule and visit the other stops for more giveaways!
Arrow of the Mist
by Christina Mercer

I got a copy in exchange for an honest review

Blurb from Goodreads: From Publishers Weekly–“Ancient magic and herbal lore mark this engaging, fast-moving fantasy with a botanical bent. Lia, 15, is a winning heroine, discovering and wielding her magical gifts. Well developed characters, elegant dialogue, trickster creatures, exciting scenes of mystic battle and intriguing riddles stir up a powerful potion that will charm readers.”

Terror strikes the Celtic inspired kingdom of Nemetona when barbed roots breach the veil of a forbidden land and poison woodsmen, including 15-year-old Lia’s beloved father. Lia and three others embark on a quest to the forbidden land of Brume to gather ingredients for the cure. But after her elder kinsman is attacked and poisoned, she and her cousin, Wynn, are forced to finish the quest on their own.

Lia relies on her powerful herbal wisdom and the memorized pages of her late grandmother’s Grimoire for guidance through a land of soul-hungry shades, trickster creatures, and uncovered truths about the origin of Brume and her family’s unexpected ties to it. The deeper they trek into the land, the stronger Lia’s untapped gift as a tree mage unfolds. When she discovers the enchanted root’s maker, it forces her to question everything about who she is and what is her destiny. Ultimately she must make a terrible choice: keep fighting to save her father and the people of the lands or join with the power behind the deadly roots to help nature start anew.

My Review:
The blurb really captured my attention for this book. I did like the story, but it did fell a bit flat to me. The story is great, but I just wished it came more alive.

Let me start with the story, this book is a story-based book. The story is solid and interesting. Everything makes sense and the characters go on an epic adventure to save the main characters dad. I really liked the story and the focus on nature, herbs and trees. I think the story was really good, but the writing style didn’t really worked for me. Also it is told from the third person perspective and for me this usually means I feel more distanced from the main character. It feels like a story is told, this happened and then that, then they did this. That is not to say the story isn’t good, in fact the story is the part about this book that I liked most. My main problem is more with other parts of the book, like the writing style and lack of connection with the characters.

While I liked the main character I never felt like I really knew her. Things happened and she reacted, but I didn’t feel it. I didn’t really got a sense of what she went trhough and muhc of it is told rather than showed. Also the third person perspective makes it more difficult for me to connect with the main characters. The side characters are mostly quite shallow and I didn’t feel like I got to know them at all. There just wasn’t enough depth to the characters. Also the ‘evil guy’ is really cliché and he seemed to have no deeper motive or any real personality. He just was the ‘evil guy’ of the story and he is evil and that’s it. I think my lack of connection with the characters is one of the things that bothered me the most, because while I liked the story and I did want to know what happened next on the other hand I didn’t care about the characters and found it difficult to really connect with them and the story.

The world building is there, although I wished there was more. The world of Brume is explained, but the normal world almost not. It is difficult to realize the greatness of Brume, without a good understanding of what the normal world is like. And they head so soon on their yourney to find a cure for the main characters dad that there is no time to get acquainted with the normal world. Also a map of the world would’ve been handy, because lots of the time I had no idea where they where or where it was in respect to the other places they where. Also sometimes the travel seem to take long, but then when they went back it seemed over really soon. The world is really elaborate and I felt like there was a lot of world building, but still there wasn’t enough. Every tree was special and they came across special creatures and water and so many other thingsit felt at some times there was too much world building in consideration with the rest, but on the other hand there still was so much that was left unexplained.

To Conclude: while I really liked the story, I didn’t really feel connected to the main character. This might be in part due to the third person perspective. Also the side characters lacked depth and while there was a lot of world building, there were still a lot of things that weren’t explained.

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You can add Arrow of the Mist to your to-read list on Goodreads

You can buy Arrow of the Mist here:
Amazon
B&N
Kobo
Smashwords

About the Author:
Christina Mercer writes fiction in addition to mothering two young adults, a pack of large dogs, and about 100,000 honeybees. Her varied interests prompted her to study creative writing, earn her official degree in Accounting, become a CPA, acquire a certificate in Herbal Studies, and keep honeybees. She took Writer’s Best in Show at the 2012 SCBWI CA North/Central Regional Conference and was a semi-finalist in the 2010 Amazon Breakout Novel Award Contest. You can find her at www.christinamercer.com or working as the Reviews Director at www.indie-visible.com

You can find her here:
Website
Goodreads
Facebook
Twitter

You have the chance to win an e-copy of Arrow of the Mist! Just enter the rafflecopter below!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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8 responses to “Blog Tour: Arrow of the Mist by Christine Mercer

  1. I like stories dealing with magic but I know how an author’s interpretation of fantasy sometimes can make or break the book.

    • I think the magic is done really well in this book, it’s really original. Even though I would’ve preferred more explanation.

  2. Not connecting to the characters can make it really hard to get into a story, but I’m glad you enjoyed the story regardless. Great review, Lola! 🙂

    • Well you’re just in time for entering the giveaway, good luck! This book certainly is an original fantasy read, so if you like fantasy you probably will enjoy this one!

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