J.Y.T. Kennedy

Dominion is a well written book with clever prose, an interesting story line, and a strong female lead character. The writing is very descriptive, well-thought out and intelligent. However, I feel that this intelligence prevents the reader from seeing the heart. The story line elements are all well designed to be emotional, without actually inspiring emotion in the reader. I felt detached from the main character, and if I were not reading this book to review here on LibraryThing, I most show more likely would have put it down and never returned, because I just didn't care what happened to the characters. I didn't have the emotional involvement necessary to keep me constantly wondering what was going to happen next. Honestly I think it's the way I would write a novel - too much focus on saying exactly the right things the right way getting in the way of the emotional importance of the story. It is something that I'm working on myself in playing music, so perhaps that's why it was so striking to me in this novel. I do think it is a finely crafted novel, and rewarding to stick with and finish. It would be an enjoyable read for many. show less

Reminiscent of The Lord of the Flies, this tale of Gilna's growth and transformation moves along at break-neck pace. I was pleased and surprised how easily I was able to immerse myself with the story, even with the pure brutality of the Kurathk. I think the hard consonants of the warrior barbarian names, titles and language worked well to portray this 185-page novel's themes. I tend to shy away from stories that embrace pagan themes and ritual, and this is one that does so unequivocally. As show more such I wanted to finish this and be done with it. At the end, I felt "What a waste" -- but not because of the time invested in reading this book, but due to the ultimate fulfillment of the story. show less

Synopsis:

As an apprentice perfumer, Gilna returns to her home village after ending her studies at the city of Nenaril Jad. Just when his village teacher is introducing her to the mystifying Dreamworld, a plague attacks the village where they live, and it kills many of their habitants, including Gilna's teacher. Then, when the village tries to recover from the devastation, a tribe of barbarians (the Kurathk) slaughter the survivors, taking the children and Gilna to live with them.

Personal show more opinion:

Being a "newcomer" to the genre, I enjoyed this read. The author creates a fictitious world which is so credible and involving, to the extent that, despite the differences in terms of civilization and culture, you can draw some parallelisms with our own reality and troubles (e.g. power, racism, etc.).

Gilna is an interesting character, being easy to be fond of her; she's a strong woman who faces many difficulties during the entire novel, and all along she's debating her own ideas, morality and beliefs because of the things that happen to her, which cause her to evolve as a being. I must admit that many times I withdrew from the story wondering what would I do if I were in her shoes, and that was cool.

However, I found very difficult to love or to care for any other character. The important story was Gilna's, but the novel is full of shallow characters. Moreover, many facts seem crucial at times when finally they're not, and I ended the book thinking that the author might have thought of an ending when she began to write, and chose a different one for whatever reason. Particularly, I find the last pages a little foreseeable, as well as disappointing, for some misteries that keep you intrigued during the novel seem to fade away without a clear answer and without having achieved to be notable for the story as a whole (e.g. the Dreamworld).

The best part of the book it's obviously the evolution of Gilna as a character, and I enjoyed very much the passages where she wonders her own life. But the aftertaste is bitter, because with a better ending and more developed characters it could have been a much better read. show less

I really wanted to like this book. The storyline is good, the main character is interesting, the idea of "perfumers" highly interesting, but....I could not get past the names of groups or the leaders of the raiders....I read about half and was really into the storyline, but realized, after Gilna met the male twin (I cannot remember his name or what he was called), that I have no clue as to the hierarchy of this group or who is who....I am so highly irritated, I want to finish, but cannot. show more The names of things are all spelled with random H's and make all the names look just similiar enough to be confusing. How frustrating.

Great idea, poor usage of random letters. show less