The AnaSwitch: Cloaker Chronicle One

by Angie Baron

Helanar Gatwick has no idea that she’s living on the edge of two worlds. Her father has just died and she thinks she is a human named Ann Hare – but one can hardly call oneself human if one’s mother is an Elf and one’s father a Cloaker... When she finds an innocent-looking book and picks it up, she is whisked away to a strange, old mansion, where six creatures called Cloakers live. But their smiles and pleas of innocence disguise the magic they are bent on working, a magic they call a cure, although the cure brings death.Helanar must join forces with Vincent Valerio, Jasper Cadelle, Misty Hailstone, Dade Tetwick, Natasha Zink and Hallimond Small – a band of dynamic heroes, all with their own secrets and talents – to find the AnaSwitch, which is is missing, and which will mean the end of Helanar, its heir, if it is not found.

• ISBN10: 1780884338
• ISBN13: 9781780884332
• Publish Date: 1 February 2013
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 14 December 2016
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing
• Imprint: Matador
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 448
• Language: English

Reviews

[wyvernfriend]

This one didn't really grasp me, when I start criticising "framing devices" and how "the author is trying hard to be clever" on Twitter, ther's something between the book and me that ain't working, when I go to check up the publisher to find out something about them, and sigh about them being a self-publisher, then the battle between me and the story is lost.

It's not a terrible read, it's just not one that pleased me. The characters felt paper thin and Misty didn't work for me, her tweeness made me want to shake her occasionally and then made me want to sit down with a red pencil and excise her from the book.

The author threw all the ideas at the book, a good editor would have made her remove a chunk of them. The framing device of talking to the audience needs to be consistent and not just thrown in occasionally, the infodump of how the world works needed to be handled better (not using the unhinged character to do this would probably help), Ana came across as almost completely unaware of how the world worked, even though she regularly visits the library. When Helanar discovers her real name and suggests it's use instead of the name she has been going by (Ann) I don't think she'd agree as quickly to being nicknamed back to that name.

I think what annoyed me most about this was there was potential there, but it wasn't fulfilled.

Ann Hare's father has died and the discovery of the reality of who she is and the truth about the world around her. She's really Helanar Gatwick; born to an Elven mother and a Cloaker father; she finds her life upside down when she finds a book in the Library (ah, that device, oh and library staff would be more inclined to look at a book and say it wasn't theirs if it doesn't have a barcode or RFID tag or marks indicating ownership; not just because it's blank; content is irrevelant, ownership matters) and finds herself in a mansion filled with strange people, she has to find the lost AnaSwitch, her inheritance, and help the forces of good defeat the forces of evil.

I came to this one with no preconceptions but this one didn't work for me. I had no problem putting it down and debated abandoning it a few times. I have no urge to pick up the next one and frankly I would urge the author to work with a good editor in future ventures.