MOONTIDE QUARTET CHARACTERS SERIES

This is not a series that really needed to be four books long but it is drawn out and Unholy War barely adds anything new to the story.

The characters seem like they are just treading water and it is not until the very end until it picks up the pace and starts to become enjoyable. It drags on with very little point and the plot doesnвЂ™t go anywhere for around seven hundred pages. Unholy War is nowhere near as enjoyable as Scarlet Tides. It actually resulted in a very interesting ethical debate. I also liked CymвЂ™s arc as she spent the novel agonising over desiring the man who killed her mother. I loved Elena and Kazim, their growing love was a high point as was Alaron and RamitaвЂ™s and the last hundred or so pages pushed their stories forward after having them hang on for so long. ItвЂ™s hard to completely care about a story when you start forgetting parts of it because the characters donвЂ™t appear for so long. Portia Tolidi fares even worse, she drops out relatively early on and doesnвЂ™t reappear until the epilogue. Cym, for example, last appears on page 255 and doesnвЂ™t pop back up again until page 441. Brett, Hair spends chapter upon chapter with certain characters and then they drop out of the story for long periods of time. ItвЂ™s kind of like The Demon Core series by Peter V.

If the pacing is slow then the structure of the book is done very weirdly. At this point, I donвЂ™t think IвЂ™m ever going to warm to her and I just wish she would have stopped being so obsessed with being a lesbian.

I still dislike Cera, however, and all of her POVs made me want to stab myself in the eye. Seth Korion got a much needed dose of character development and, once he stops lusting over a teenage girl, GyleвЂ™s plotting became more interesting. I absolutely adored Elena and Kazim and Alaron and RamitaвЂ™s chapters and I enjoyed CymвЂ™s and RamonвЂ™s. Despite the stagnant story, they continued to grow. Saying that, the characters are the main saving grace. No wonder theyвЂ™re all having so much sex with each other, they must be so bored waiting around for their parts to play. They donвЂ™t really have anything to do until theyвЂ™re required for the grand conclusion so their stories just drag on and on. It only serves to bridge Scarlet Tides and AscendantвЂ™s Rites so, for most of the novel, the characters flounder. The problem is that most of this novel doesnвЂ™t need to exist. What they choose to do with the Scytale could change Urte forever. For Ramon, trapped behind enemy lines, it is one more obstacle in his desperate attempt to get his men safely home.ДЄnd while the armies of East and West clash in ever-more-bloody conflict, emperors, inquisitors and assassins hunt the Scytale of Corineus, the key to ultimate power, which is in the hands of the most unlikely guardians: failed mage Alaron and market-girl Ramita, pregnant widow of the worldвЂ™s greatest mage. For the Queen of Javon, it is a beacon as she seeks new ways to overthrow her usurper husband and reclaim the country for her brother. In the wake of a devastating battle, everything has changed: the East is rising, bringing equal measures of hope and despair to Urte.ДЇor Elena and Kazim, the victory is a call to arms against the renegade spymaster Gurvon Gyle. Summary: Emperor ConstantвЂ™s crusade is teetering on the edge of disaster. For large parts, however, it was rather a slog to get through. The second book, Scarlet Tides pushed the story along at a decent pace but Unholy War grinds almost to a complete halt before it picks up at the end of the novel. IвЂ™m just going to come right out and say it: Unholy War is too long with too little happening over itвЂ™s rather large page count.

Moontide quartet characters