J. T. Greathouse

At first, I didn't like Foolish Cur/Alder, but it was interesting how he developed throughout the book and how he changed. I think it is many times the case in real life that people are born into a nation and taught to think a certain way. It is actually very hard to break away from such thought patterns especially if everybody around you condemns your new way of thinking, and, as in the book, it can take many years and many (sometimes terrible) experiences to finally tip you over to the show more other way of thinking. Can't wait to find out what happens next to Foolish Cur and his new adventures. As I've lived a year in China when I was young (and learned some Mandarin), I found this world very relatable and well described. One can see that the author also possibly lived in the Far East for some time and also knows something of their language. show less

Took a bit to find its footing but it grew on me. It seemed to me Greathouse was finding his voice, and aside from a Name of the Wind cringe moment or two, tHotSK became its on thing. Yeah, besides the aforementioned, I felt Robert Jordan influence, maybe a dash of some others, but the writing is straightforward. The narrative remained tight and, though I've never skimmed, I can see why some others I saw in reviews didn't feel the need to. Kept my interest and I'll be looking for the next show more one. I wavered from 3 to 4 but settling on 4 because the strengths outweighed the weaknesses for me.

The editing slip-ups were some doozies, but thankfully not too many covered the page. There were some time-lapse moments that felt inappropriate, and some other moments that he took a small brush to that I think could have been lingered on to enhance the novel. show less

Entertaining fantasy. Very well done, interesting concept, characters, all that. One small point is that I found on five or six occasions places where there was HTML code for a quotation mark. Happened often enough that it started to get distracting. Still, well done, didn't count it against my score, etc.

The story follows immediately after the ending of "The Hand of the Sun King". I found this book is faster paced and more plot forward than the first one. Even though i have read these types of stories more before (rebellion against an empire by the original settlers); this series asks an important and interesting question to us.

How far will you go? What is the morality of the war? etc. Both the factions has to answer this question. I really liked the way the author takes the story to answer show more this too.

The world-building was excellent and the author spends a lot of time describing this. Overall, it was an enjoyable book that delved into the morally grey area of rebellions. show less