Spirit Gate

A start to a new and excellent epic fantasy series from the ever-readable Kate Elliott. After a gripping and shocking prologue, the story is sprawling and slow-moving, and the main cast and the central thrust of the narrative take some time to cohere (this may explain why it's actually taken me some months to get though it) - but it's certainly building up a decent momentum, and I'm very keen to get to the next book now. As always, Elliott is top-notch at world-building; here's she's painstakingly portraying multiple cultures across several continents, and unlike many fantasy authors, she understands the fine balance between supplying enough detail to build her world and totally bogging her narrative down with unnecessary description. show more Other things that particularly impress me are her sharp examination of gender roles in her various cultures, the slow but growing sense of horror lurking behind everything, an (almost) completely non-white cast, and last but not least, giant eagles :-). show less

Ponderous "worldbuilding" unrelated to the story just killed this for me. Let's describe all the shops on the street while we walk towards something that matters. Let's make the reader do math in their head to figure out the various "ages" when people have ceremonies to move on to the next phase of life, then have that not matter to the story. Tell me that the group is annoyed with the cleric rather than showing me, then have the cleric leave the group so none of it matters.

I found the whole thing an insult to the reader's attention. Get an editor. And for God's sake, tell a story that I can care about.

I enjoyed the author's Crown of Stars series quite a lot. This book has been on my shelf for a long time and I finally picked it up. But sadly I did not finish it. I nearly gave up at page 100, kept going to page 400 and then just thought life is too short to carry on with a book that I was not enjoying. I just didn't care about anybody in it. Too much unnecessary detail. Several points of view can work but when the reader cares nothing for any of them you are in trouble. Sorry Ms Elliott but this is not for me.

I picked this up after an LT discussion around another book with the same name. This is the (slightly) more well known one. Enjoyable. Low fantasy, hence little out-right magic, but ghosts appear to a few characters and there's the chance that the ancient gods might be be-stirring themselves to take a hand in the fate of a country.

We follow a few characters living different lives in different cultures and countries as the tides of war and politics eventually cast them together in a small town. The town is situated in the Hundred, a collection of provinces of shared rule. Abandoned by the gods and Guardians some years ago, they're left with only the reeves mounted on giant eagles to keep law and order. Few and far between failing in show more numbers their respect is further diminished when outlaws start a concerted campaign from the North. Meanwhile the captain of a troop of mercenaries on the run from politics pick up's a wife from one of the countries his nation had subjugated. Familiar with the marketplace customs of most of the world, despite being unaccustomed to the rigours of journeying she provides useful information in keeping the troop gainfully
occupied on their flight north.

Nothing really jumps out as special, but it's well written engaging and enjoyable in a fairly sensible world. The varying religious customs take a bit of getting used to, but it all comes together in the end. There is an slightly too obvious bias towards various earth cultures, but enough differences remain for it not to feel racist or pointedly attacking one culture.

I will try the sequels sometime.
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Bogs down a bit in the middle and considering it's quite long this is something that could well have been avoided. It's not always clear who is where or what faction they belong to. An unnecessary introduction of another character's POV late in the book also adds extra verbiage. show less

I very nearly stopped reading this after the first chapter - killing off the first viewpoint character right then really kind of blew it for me. But, I soldiered on. A couple bland chapters later and I was ready to give it up again. It seemed remarkably predictable, and the characterization just wasn't compelling enough to hold my interest. But I read a review that suggested that the ending more than made up for the book being a bit slow. I found it more than a bit slow - more like telling about 4 different stories kind of lamely in the same volume, with random viewpoint changes and occasional unexplained time shifts. So I kept on reading, on the off chance it really would get better.

It didn't. The end of this volume was very nearly show more what I expected it to be at the end of the first chapter. The viewpoint changes were choppy and often inexplicable. As I feared, this isn't so much a volume one as a part one. The ending didn't satisfy me enough to be the end of a book, but the story doesn't interest me enough for me to keep reading it.

I had thought that, it being fairly simple, it would be a good thing to read while recovering from surgery. Fortunately for me, but unfortunately for this book, I didn't need any pain medicine - it might have been more interesting if I were a bit drugged up.

I will say that the author's done very good, extensive world building. Someone who's more interested in the universe, and is comfortable with a broad, meandering, ensemble story would enjoy this more than I did. show less

This is the start of a series and as such has a lot of characters and several part of a new world and an unusual world at that. This worldbuilding is coherent and the variety of people and their reactions to events are quite interesting and felt solid to me. I dived into this book and regretted each breath I had to take interrupted by life, work, family and bus-stops. It's a seriously heavy tome and really is well detailed.

The first part is a shock. You're introduced to Reeve Marit, the Reeves are a group of people who fly large Eagles (yeah, yeah, mysical bond with animal, again, don't let it put you off) and dispense justice in the Hundred. They used to answer to the Guardians but they've disappeared, and are starting to move from show more fact to legend. Marit's partner is Joss. When Marit dies, the shocker of the start of the book, he mourns her and drowns himself in alcohol and meaningless relationships.

Mai is regarded by her family as a bit of a waste, a daydreamer, she's pretty and knows how to bargain well at the family's market stall so when Captain Anji of the occupying force in her lands offers for her hand, her family jump at the chance. They also jump at the chance to get rid of their troublesome son Shai, who speaks to ghosts.

The paths of these and a few more start to converge, and along the way they find that there is someone building an army and trying to undermine the fabric of society of the Hundred. What are their motives? Why have the Guardians disappeared? Is it a natural progression or is there something else going on?

I really did enjoy reading this and want the second book now! There were times when the story lagged and where I lost track of the people involved where, which is why it doesn't score a perfect 5 but it came really close. show less

Kate Elliott is the author of the highly successful Crown of Stars series. Crossroads is her new series, a seven-volume series which is divided into two trilogies with a linking book between them. Spirit Gate is the first book of the first trilogy (to be followed by Shadow Gate and Traitor's Gate).

In this book, Elliott devotes considerable chunks of text to painting a picture of a detailed, alternative world. As a result, you have to grapple with large amounts of geography, an array of cultures and a whole string of characters. This makes for very slow reading initially, which can be quite heavy-going as you struggle to absorb all the information.

However, stick with it, because it is worth it. About halfway through, the story really show more gets going. There is a variety of convincing characters, a fascinating mix of cultures and plenty of excitement, mystery, romance and adventure to keep you turning pages.

If you like fast, action packed novels that rush from fight to fight, then this probably won't appeal to you. However, if you enjoy world building, sympathetic character development and multi faceted story lines, then you may enjoy it as much as I did.

I started the second book as soon as I closed this one. show less