Review: The Bone Sword by Walter Rhein
By Angela Roberts
January 5, 2011
The Bone Sword, by Walter Rhein, was released on November 1st by Rhemalda Publishing, a small-press publisher based in Washington State. The novel centers on Malik, a former member of the elite Camden Guard and wandering swordsman, and his adventures after a twist of fate finds him protecting twin orphans with a miraculous ability to heal from an evil priest intent on destroying them for witchcraft. The trio flees to the mountains to escape the cleric and his villainous noble collaborator, and eventually end up at the center of a peasant revolt which attracts the attention of Malik’s former master, forcing him to confront his inner demons.
I’ll admit that, at first, I wasn’t sure that I would like this novel. It’s not that I’m not into fantasy; I am pretty much considered the fantasy component of our little editorial group. Thus, I was assigned to do this review. I have my own pet peeves and pet pleasures when it comes to fantasy, epic and action-adventure fantasy in particular, and there were elements of the book that picked at those pet peeves. But that’s hardly something confined to any one book. And there were definitely parts that spoke to my pet pleasures. In fact, what I discovered as I read The Bone Sword was that it slowly seduced me. We received a PDF copy of the novel for our review, and being one of those types that hates reading off a computer screen (ironically, one might say, since I run an online magazine), I printed the novel and read it in chunks so that it might not completely overwhelm my printer. And as I printed and read, and printed and read, I found that I was able to go less and less time between printings. I began printing larger chunks because I told myself that I needed such and such chapter, or stopping earlier would cause too much suspense. But really, I was just getting into the novel more and more, and I had trouble putting it down.
Now, no novel is perfect. And I won’t use this review as a soapbox to air out my frustrations with the fantasy genre. But there are certain things that one should be mindful of when considering picking up this book. It’s an adventure. It’s fun. But, if you are the kind of reader that gets really offended by the occasional use of cliché or melodrama, you probably won’t like this novel. If you’re a creative writing snob, stay away. Did I find it a bit annoying that almost every villain was a pedophile? That it became a sort of shorthand for who was good and who was evil? Yes. Did I think Jasmine was a huge deus ex machina? Yes. Did I think some parts of the plot were rushed, especially in the latter half of the novel, and could have been lingered over a little longer to make them more believable? Yes. Did I wish that some of the tension hadn’t been diffused too easily? Yes. These were all things that gave me pause both while reading the book and thinking about how I would approach this review. After all, for a lot of readers, these points are deal breakers.
But, and this is a big but, I still rather enjoyed the novel. I liked the protagonists. Malik, Noah and Jasmine were well fleshed out and individualized. The supporting characters like Denz and Gerard are interesting and possess clear voices. They don’t fade into the background. There appears to have been a fair amount of thought put into the entire secondary world setting. There is a very prettily-drawn map at the beginning of the book, but I think I consulted it once. I didn’t need it to follow the story. And it’s a good story, entertaining and plotted well enough that you get drawn in and there are no distracting loose threads. As I said, my only problem with the plotting was that it might be a little too condensed. It’s Fantasy; the Fantasy genre reader will usually allow you to muse a little and focus on stuff more than, say, the literary reader.
So, did I like it? Yes. Would I recommend it? Yes. Would I like to see a sequel? Yes, if only because I would like to see more involving these characters. And if you like intriguing adventure fantasy, you’ll pick up a copy of The Bone Sword too.
Links:
- The Publisher, Rhemalda Publishing.
- The novel can be found here on Amazon.