kalventure
Written on Apr 14, 2018
[b:City of Shards|38119693|City of Shards (Spellgiver Book 1)|Steve Rodgers|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1516598547s/38119693.jpg|59807241] is a fantasy book that I wanted to love: a new world, misunderstood magic, and mysterious pasts. I am in the minority, but I could not get into this book. I spent about 3 weeks struggling with the book to get to 25% but just did not ever become engaged. I cannot pinpoint a reason for this: the writing is good and the premise is interesting, but I never connected with the story.
Larin is an orphan that lives with his drug-addicted uncle with a mysterious past that rules a four-block area of the Wormpile; outside of this "safe-zone" gangs rule the streets. Larin has a condition or curse where he yells out these mysterious words, and to protect him his uncle tries to hide him from everyone else. Much of the 25% that I read, Larin tries to understand and overcome this curse and have some semblance of a normal life.
The world he lives in has a complex political structure and back history of religion, the latter of which was particularly interesting to me (dragons! dragon worship?!). The world is exposed to the reader slowly, and is really meant to be a character-driven tale. Much of the first quarter of the book is highlighting Larin's life growing up in relation to this affliction, and the overall worldbuilding is developed slowly around that.
This is a slow-paced book, but that in and of itself isn't the reason for my apathy. I did wind up putting the book down to read something else, and after almost two weeks I just don't want to pick it up. Life is too short for me to read something that I am not engaged in, but just because this book wasn't for me doesn't mean that it won't be for you if you enjoy high fantasy narratives with complex characters and backstory.
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