CJ Perry

Dark Communion is a novel in which minotaurs have taken over the world. They enslave and impregnate women who die from obstetric complications. Armed with only faith, Ayla and her enslaved people lead a revolution against an army of minotaurs led by the immortal son of a “Goddess.”

It could have worked, but it faltered and failed, miserably; it jarred and shocked. Though there could have been good writing, yet dialogue was often perfunctory and sometimes indistinct from thoughts. show more Moreover, it was hard to care about the characters mostly because there was noting about them one could identify with, or because violence dehumanized them. The story itself kept feeling like it bordered on the indecent.

More problematic: novels exhibiting word choices as thoughtless as here, are disparaging and subversive to the very act of reading…at one point a character says in prayer “you guard the lives of this world from the gods?” Prayer takes place frequently in the novel because the protagonist is a priestess, and passages like this came across as loaded with un-examined meaning…what does “God” mean? Half-God? God that is turned into something else?... would a God ever have wicked intentions? Why? Doesn’t that contradict what it is to be a “God?” In truth, limitations, flaws, weaknesses are fundamentally contradictory to the term “God.” Yet the author (indeed many authors) bandy the term about as though it’s a plot devise. It's used in the title of this series but isn't used in its popular sense. The author likely, actually, means something else, it came across as aloof and careless, surly readers (at least) deserve more consideration... In any other medium or art this shallowness or lapse in logic can be attributed to lack of understanding of, or familiarity with words; bad judgement maybe, but in writing?! If words don’t matter in writing, where do they matter?... This problem extended to the overall story, which I thought fundamentally (i.e. generally) lacked meaning and depth.

Some may overlook such failings…still, others will expect nothing short of an “offensive content” warning because there are several unpleasant, violent depictions in this book. It also uses some profanity. show less