Seeker

Hunter is about to leave Widow's Vale in search of his parents who he recently discovered were living in a small town that resided in Canada. Hunter doesn't know what to expect to find after eleven years of not seeing them, but he can't fight the urge to see them. This is what he's been waiting for since the day they had left. He wanted nothing more to see them, except for having Morgan Rowlands join him on the trip, but he knew that was very unlikely. Morgan was only seventeen and her adoptive parents would never allow it. So Hunter finds himself having to make the journey, that might change his life forever, alone.

Once reaching the town that his sources said his parents lived, Hunter couldn't have been prepared for what met him. Not show more only does he find out that his mother had died a few months before, he also finds a shell of the man he once knew to be his father. Hunter can't believe the way his father had been living for the last few months. It's was just too upsetting for Hunter to see.

His father's living conditions is nothing compared to the secret that Hunter unlocks about his father. A secret that puts Hunter in a awkward position as a seeker for the witches' council.

Along with having to take care of his father, the council has a mission for Hunter to complete. There's a witch collecting true names of living things that must be stopped. Justine Courceau wasn't what Hunter expected when the council had sent him to investigate. She was beautiful, intelligent, and enticing. Hunter believed that with a bit of persuasion, he could educate Justine in the harm of collecting the true names of living things. What Hunter didn't realize was that Justine didn't want to be educated. She didn't see how keeping true names was wrong and didn't believe the council had any right to dictate what was right and wrong for witches.

Even though Hunter had put all his faith and trust into the council, he began to discover that the council might not be as innocent as it claimed to be. Especially after he find out that they kept the secret of his parents whereabouts from him when his mother had still been alive.

He now had some important choices to make about who he was and what he was going to do, especially after just gaining a new enemy who he had humiliated and scared.

The tenth book of the Sweep series is written from another perspective- Hunter's perspective. It's was quite intriguing to hear things through Hunter's insight. I found it quite entertaining to learn that Hunter isn't as sure and centered as Morgan sees him. In the previous books, Hunter is reserved and dignified, but in this book, you get to see a side of Hunter that no one else sees. It's refreshing as it's enticing. The suffering that Hunter goes through after discovering his father is heart-breaking. He had waited eleven years to see his parents, only to be disappointed with what he finds. The determination to help his father is endearing and touching, especially while enduring the emotional turmoil that he feels during the whole adventure.

Seeker is an outstanding novel in the Sweep series. I found myself captivated within it's pages and couldn't put it down until I had finished. Definitely worth the time of reading. show less

If you wrote a book which included characters who speak another language, would you want to make sure the phrases you wrote were accurate?
How about if you were an editor or publisher? Would you care about accurate translations?

It was kind of a nice idea to have this book in Hunter's POV (although the Sweep series is getting progressively worse--all "tell" and no "show") but the insistence on using "french" was excruciating. Auto-translate did BETTER, actually, than the author, when I checked it, so, actually it was really bad. I'll share some samples:


“ ‘Vous être aussi un sorcier’…she said….
‘Oh, no, ah…’ I began….
‘Oui, oui’ she said with quiet insitence. ‘Vous suivez-moi. Maintenant.”
‘Pourquoi?’ I asked show more awkwardly.
‘Nous besoin de vous,’ she said shortly. We need you.“Maintenant.’ Now.”
…..
“Oui, oui. Vous avez fatigué”
...
"‘Comme ça?’ Like that? ‘Comme ça, et ne comme ça,’ she said, unhelpfully.”


My advice is:
1. If you’re using French (or any other language) have your characters begin a simple exchange, like, “Bonjour” “Bonjour” and then continue in English using your writerly skills to convey the fact that now we’re suspending our disbelief and talking in French; it’s done in movies all the time. (and, I might add, getting more and more accurate. Stay tuned for a blog post on the funniest misuses of foreign language in film and TV)
2. Get a French-speaking friend to look it over.
3. Pay a native French speaker to look it over
4. DO NOT USE AN INTERNET TRANSLATOR.
Spell check seems to work well—the accents in the above excerpts are remarkably accurate—but don’t confuse spell-check with grammar-check or auto-translators; it’s a path to disaster.
5. Next time, pick a language, like, say, Faroese, with well under 100,000 native speakers. Personally, as I said, I would care about the accuracy of whatever language I were using, but if you are using a language you don’t know in your book, maybe don’t use French next time, because there’s a lot more potential for looking like an unprofessional idiot (and even a parochial, uneducated Amurrican) when making mistakes in a language that well over 100 million speak natively, not to mention the half billion or so who speak (or read or learn) it as a third or fourth language.
6. None of the above points 1-5 are exclusive of the others. show less

This 10th book in the series is told from Hunter's perspective and takes place away from all the other characters in the series, as Hunter seeks his parents and is called to do council business. This installment does a lot to advance the plot and introduce new characters. It also lets us get to know Hunter on a more personal level but I missed the folks at home. I am looking forward to his returning to Widow's Vale to see how the events of this book will play out.

The switch-up with the point of view was interesting. Hunter feels more real and human now. I always liked him but now he feels more real.

Took me a little while to get into this one after 9 books with Morgan as the narrator..but once I got used to it being from Hunters point of view it was a really good book.I really felt alot of compassion for Hunter after finding his dad.

I really liked this book. It was nice to see a different side of Hunter and learn more about him. He puts up with allot of things from book to book. I cannot wait to see what happens in the next book.

Hunter’s story – he goes off to find his father and also ends up on Council business. Ok addition to the series.