Those Above by Daniel Polansky
My rating:
I received a free copy of Those Above from the publisher in return for an honest review.
I was really looking forwards to Those Above and when my review copy arrived through the post I was eager to jump right in. The beginning of the book spent a lot of time introducing us to the characters and world building, I found that very tedious to get through but I carried on in the hope that once the scene was set, things would pick up. They didn't. I still carried on with the book, determined to ride it out until the pace picked up or it grabbed my imagination and attention, but still nothing was happening. All I found was pages and pages of overly wordy and complex story telling and really not much of a plot anywhere to be found.
The characters fell rather flat. None of them stood out or were particularly likeable for me. The plot moved so slowly that it felt like nothing was happening at all. I honestly couldn't even begin to summarize the plot of the book, there was very little progression in the story at all in my view. There's no storyline to speak of.
The writing style is overly wordy, drawn out and complex. Pages and pages of words that really aren't needed and there was also lots of unnecessary long words thrown in that achieved nothing but to make the story more confusing and more complex than needed. I felt at times like I should have had a thesaurus on hand to try to decipher what I was reading. The language, specifically the cursing, of the lower level (poorer) inhabitants was far too modern to fit into the world the author portrayed.
Reading Those Above really started to feel more like a chore rather than an enjoyable experience for me. My attention wasn't on the story, it didn't grab me or immerse me in another world like I expect from a good fantasy. The pace and storyline of the book is virtually non existent and the little that there is, is completely overshadowed by the overly descriptive and verbose writing.
This one just wasn't for me.
Reviews also posted to my blog: Scarlet's Web
Facebook | Twitter | G+ | BookLikes | Leafmarks
My rating:
I received a free copy of Those Above from the publisher in return for an honest review.
I was really looking forwards to Those Above and when my review copy arrived through the post I was eager to jump right in. The beginning of the book spent a lot of time introducing us to the characters and world building, I found that very tedious to get through but I carried on in the hope that once the scene was set, things would pick up. They didn't. I still carried on with the book, determined to ride it out until the pace picked up or it grabbed my imagination and attention, but still nothing was happening. All I found was pages and pages of overly wordy and complex story telling and really not much of a plot anywhere to be found.
The characters fell rather flat. None of them stood out or were particularly likeable for me. The plot moved so slowly that it felt like nothing was happening at all. I honestly couldn't even begin to summarize the plot of the book, there was very little progression in the story at all in my view. There's no storyline to speak of.
The writing style is overly wordy, drawn out and complex. Pages and pages of words that really aren't needed and there was also lots of unnecessary long words thrown in that achieved nothing but to make the story more confusing and more complex than needed. I felt at times like I should have had a thesaurus on hand to try to decipher what I was reading. The language, specifically the cursing, of the lower level (poorer) inhabitants was far too modern to fit into the world the author portrayed.
Reading Those Above really started to feel more like a chore rather than an enjoyable experience for me. My attention wasn't on the story, it didn't grab me or immerse me in another world like I expect from a good fantasy. The pace and storyline of the book is virtually non existent and the little that there is, is completely overshadowed by the overly descriptive and verbose writing.
This one just wasn't for me.
Reviews also posted to my blog: Scarlet's Web
Facebook | Twitter | G+ | BookLikes | Leafmarks
