Basic Summary: Ruban Kinoh is the best at hunting Ariels. When rumor of a new weapons formula that may eradicate the Ariels comes up, Ruban finds himself teamed up with Ashwin Kwan, a nobleman who is making the rumors worse. But there is more to Ashwin than meets the eye.
Warnings: There is violence.
Review:
Setting
The time period is our modern one. There are computers, cars, and smart phones. Most of the events take place in a fictional country of Vadran. The author did a good job of describing scenes to let you know you were in a modern time. Events in human history, of this novel, are different. For example, Ariels had ruled over humans and the humans had risen up in rebellion hundreds of years ago. I did think find it a bit off putting when the author would use well known social media platforms like Twitter in the book just because there’s so much difference in history and would that world really have all the social media things that we have now or would they be called something else? There is also the world of Vaan which is where the Ariels come from. We get some description of it but I wished for a more fleshed out vision of Vaan. Perhaps we’ll get that with the sequels.
Characters
The characters are distinct from one another in this book. Ruban is a bit of a curmudgeon in that he likes being alone more often than not and his niece is his favorite person. He can be a bit single minded driven in his hunt for Ariels and focusing on his revenge but overall I liked his character. Ashwin, I thought, is a bit more of a well rounded character. The secrets he keeps and how he manages to make everyone around him think he’s clueless was a great aspect of his character. How he played behind the scenes was awesome to see.
Plot
The plot was well structured and simple: There is a new formula of weapons to better kill Ariels, the Hunters want to protect it and the Ariels want to destroy it. Now, though that is the plot broken down into a single sentence, the story in itself is more complex. There are Ariels who don’t want to hurt humans and there are humans who work with the Ariels. And though there are side plots that are woven in, nothing gets too complicated where you wonder “BUT WHERE DID THAT COME FROM!?” In fact, the author does manage to keep it fairly straight forward. If there was one issue I had with the novel is that it tended to be repetitive in a few scenes. For example, we’d have one scene of Ruban battling Ariels and then the next chapter would repeat that scene but in Ashwin’s point of view. (All this work was 3rd person, limited Point of View). However, the writing is clean, straight forward, and well done.
Overall
I liked the premise of this book and it’s characters. I will definitely read the sequels to it.
May you get lost in a book,
Chrissy