A.M. Tuomala

I liked Erekos, but I had some problems with it as well. It has a serious case of first-novel syndrome: there’s a lot of explaining going on in these first chapters, as though the book is terribly afraid you won’t follow what’s going on. That goes away, but unfortunately my other big problem with it sticks around: the point of view shifts. Sometimes it seems like we get a slice of the point of view of every character we meet, including the ratsnake that Achane uses to send a message show more home. I’m not sure if I got more used to the POV shifting as the book went on or if there were fewer shifts overall, but I did find this less annoying as I progressed through Erekos.

And once I got into it, I fell in love with it. This is an amazing world, drawn with all kinds of complexity. I’m always thrilled to see second-world fantasy which actually acknowledges the variety of human culture, not just between nations but within them as well, and Erekos does a great job of this. You get the swamp-witches, the riverlanders, the coastal fishermen, the blonde foreign Wiegenlanders and the hillfolk Wigs, the scholars and the kings and the hunters. It’s a huge world, and I’d love to see more of it. I loved, too, how little people understood about one another – how, for instance, the king is wholly impressed with Achane’s ability to raise zombis, where the other priestesses and witches all sigh and remember the time that they tried it, too, because everyone who works magic tries to rescue a loved one from death.

The characters are wonderful, too, even if there are enough of them that I can’t tell who the protagonist is supposed to be. Is it Achane the swamp-witch, or Shabane, the sister she raised from the dead because she couldn’t stand to see her go? The warlike King Milaus with his desperation to stand up to his father’s memory, or the scholar Erlen who went to the mountains to write his thesis and ended up joining the war against the Erekoi?

I also want to give a shout-out to Erlen and Jaiger’s relationship. I loved the pair of them as soon as we met them – and you know there’s something special about the two of them when the scholar will put his companion’s name down as co-author on his book – but it was this passage that really grabbed me:

There were talks that the two of them had not had, and probably would never have; they did not need to discuss whether this was love or what it meant that they slept beside one another, whether it meant that they were comrades or brothers or lovers. On that first morning, when the sun had risen on their new freedom and the two of them had sat on the mountaintop with their hands touching, Erlen had opened his mouth as if to speak, but the way that Jeiger had looked over the plains halted any words that he might have thought were important.

By taking him to the top of the mountain and granting him the gift of the sunrise, Jeiger had said without words, You make me feel this way. Like light coming into the world.

They are asexual life-partners, and I love them for it. In fact, there are no primary romantic relationships in this book (unless you count the mother and father gods, who do spend a little time walking around among men), which is a delightful change, and I really appreciated it.

As much as I wanted to love Erekos, though, there was always something distancing about it. It seemed like every time I started to get deep into the story, something yanked me back. I want to call it another symptom of first-novel syndrome; the narrator is a little too present, which adds another layer between the reader and the story. There’s a line from the climactic battle that seems to sum up both what I loved about Erekos and also the problems I had with it:

It was hell, but the Erekoi have no word for hell, so they called it war instead.

It’s that little reminder that I’m reading a story about a world that is not my own that shoves a wedge in between me and the characters. Still, despite the occasional attempts of the novel to the contrary, I enjoyed Erekos and would recommend it to anyone else looking for some original new fantasy. show less

Erudite Erekos

*I received this e-book for free from Candlemark & Gleam Publishing.

This book gets a solid 3 gnomes and a gnome hat out of 5 gnomes for great descriptive language, intriguing characters and well though out world building.

The cover draws you right in and makes you want to investigate this book, it has a mysterious yet creepy vibe.

I personally could have gone without all the pronunciation stuff in the beginning I prefer stuff like that to be at the end of the book or be a lot show more shorter.

This story caught my attention with the way that it's told. It has a lot of points of view so you get to experience just about every character's story. There are gods, men, women, magic and even a zombi.

The story opens with Achane using magic to bring her sister Shabane back to life and it works. Sadly though she doesn't come all the way back and is stuck as a zombi with a soul. Achane's goal is to get her sister brought fully back to life so her and Shabane head out to Terichone's temple. While there she is spotted by King Milaus who is a little too interested in her and her zombi raising abilities so he basically kidnaps her and leaves Shabane flailing in a mud puddle.

The story them picks up through the very interesting eyes of Shabane's character and Gamela the priestess who escorts her in the attempt to go after her sister. I wish there would have been more chapters or parts that included Shabane and Gamela.

The story also shows the views of Jeiger and Erlen. Jeiger's a hunter and Erlen's a scholar, they have quite the relationship. They have an unspoken bond that makes you want to know what happened to them before this story started and what the future has in store for them.

War has been going on for awhile and the King thinks that Achane is his answer to winning and lessening lives lost. While Jeiger and Erlen and a lot of their friends are on the other side of the war. Understanding is hard to come by when men, gods and other forces are all fighting.

There are a lot of characters in this book and I don't think the reader needs to hear from all of them but that is more than made up for by the stronger characters. Even the gods are given snippets every now and then in the book which provides the readier with a view of how they see human events.

The big fight between the two separate forces could have gone on longer than it did because it did involve my favorite character Erlen and many of the other characters. Even so the ending of the book is satisfying and wraps things up nicely. I certainly hope that more is written about the world of Erekos.

Erekos does get off to a slow start but slowly but surely draws you in so you want to know what happens to these characters. Events and people come together to put the whole story into focus. If you like your fantasy books with a little zombie twist and a lot of character viewpoints, Erekos may be the book for you. show less

Interesting world building and a decent attempt in the creation of one of the main characters, though the second lead is more a collection of capabilities. The side characters are decent and well embedded in the world building. The story keeps moving in fits and starts but that it gets anywhere is more formulaic than developed.

I have to admit that I'm still getting used to reading e-books. I don't have a reader yet, and so read on my laptop. Some books, like Candlemark & Gleam's own Broken, are an easy laptop read.

Erekos, though, was a struggle, and it was difficult to keep returning to my laptop screen to continue reading. However, I recently won a hard copy paperback of the book and found myself immediately immersed in A.M. Tuomala's world. The language used is dense and beautiful. Tuomala knows how to write a show more sentence that makes me happy to read it. The story told is compelling and reveals itself at a luxurious pace. I like authors who can take their time and still keep me interested. The characters are intriguing and all sympathetic in their way.

My only criticism is that I found the ending a little unsatisfying. To be honest, I was hoping for more "zombis." Beyond that, though, I found it to be a fine fantasy read to curl up with away from any electronics. Can't wait for Tuomala's next one. show less