That doesn't say it very well, but I've read books where I've drowned, and a few brilliant works that I have learned to swim in. If it is too alien, we shouldn't just be dropped into the deep end unless we already know how to swim. We have to be able to believe in the character's world before we can believe in them. It may also just be my imagination, and if so, she has touched on an issue in Fantasy I strongly believe in. I may be confusing the basic progression of "The Hero's Journey" with religious allegory. The only criticism I have is that she seems to be dancing around a religious allegory and that was a bit distracting. Miller gave me that and I will continue to read her novels. I was looking for long fantasy novels where I could get involved with the characters and not have my attention wander. The narrator of these books handled the dialect very well but does not return to read the series that comes after, and that may be a difficult switch. These rules are meant to be broken, but it takes a good fantasy writer to do it. She writes in dialect, and she calls real things by made up names. Miller breaks a couple 'rules' of writing and does it very well. Looking at the other books available, I can see that the history behind the Innocent Mage is out there as well. This is Fantasy with characters I could understand, a lot of raw emotion, and a rich background story only hinted at. I enjoyed both books in this series very much. This was my first experience with Karen Miller's work.
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May 2023
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