The Phantom's Curse

The Phantom's Curse by Shelley Wilson is a wonderful retelling of the well-known Robin Hood story. Only that here we have Marianne as the main character.

On her sixteenth birthday, Marianne, a girl from the Link, is grated access to the city of Obanac, on which fringes she lives, to take part in the blessing. But for Marianne this day doesn't bring good luck. It's the day she looses her younger brother, Newt, to the vicious and dark lord of Obanac and learns of a dark secret in her own past.

I deeply enjoyed Maz's (as she is called by friends) story. She is a well-build character with wishes, hopes and fears and very relateable. She is no weak damsel in distress, but a fierce, strong minded young woman, who follows her own path.

The story show more itself has a fascinating plot, with evil sorcerers, black magic and the hope that if we all stay together, we can win.

It's definitely a different approach on the Robin Hood myth, but it's fast-paced, well written and has some wonderful, loveable (and hateable) characters.

And you even get a little extra story at the end, which shows a part of the story from another character's point of view. A nice extra, which I enjoyed.

If you love a good retelling of a well-known legend, then you should read this little jewel! show less

The only reason the Phantom's Curse get more than only one star is that I can see a good story, even a brilliant idea behind this book. Unfortunately, the execution does not live up to it.
First of all, the worldbuilding is non-existent. Yes, there's a terrible infodump at the beginning wrapped in a prologue, which commits all the crimes of writing prologues that exist today. The author simply throws a boring history summary at us at the beginning, but fails to expand the world as part of the story. We know there is a curse, that there is magic, but we don't have any idea about how it works. The main character has magic, but we have no idea what she can and cannot do with it. Not a single event to show us her abilities until the end when show more suddenly she turns into this saviour. We don't even know if having magic is common or rare, whether other people have it or not, etc. Nothing. Absolutely no clue. We get non-human creatures. One, to be exact. But are there more? Nope, no idea. It's just mentioned, brushed over, no explanation. Then there is the land itself: I know there's a city and then there's the Link and the plains and the mountains. And that's pretty much it what I could gather. Is this a country? A continent? Is that a whole world? Pretty small world if you ask me. What about neighbouring countries? If people are so afraid of this phantom, why aren't they trying to escape this land? What about those who were sent far away? Again, the descriptions raise a lot more questions than what they explain. This could be good. It could be interesting.
I believe that if the Phantom's Curse was expanded into an actual book, rather than a two hundred pages summary, then it could be amazing. Unfortunately, this wasn't it.
That brings me to the writing. Anyone involved in story writing heard the phrase show don't tell. I know, rules are there to be broken, etc, but this book is all telling with a little bit of showing sprinkled on top. Yes, we get scenes, but even the scenes are full of emotional tells, and we never really get a good feel of what's happening. It reads more like a creative summary than a novel.
The characters and their relationships are also hard to grasp. I mean who commits to lifelong friendship and trusts a man with their lives after meeting at a party for a couple of hours? I think the whole believability of the story failed for me at that point. The romance is slightly better, but could have been unpacked more, just like everything in this book. More words, more showing could have built the characters to their full extent, turning them into real people. We get a little hint of complexity behind the villain, but his motivations remain unclear.
Overall, The Phantom's Curse is a huge wasted potential. It could have been a great book if it was unpacked. Unfortunately, it wasn't, and what we got falls far from my expectations when it comes YA fantasy. show less

I wasn't a huge fan of this book. The pacing was off and in some parts of the story you didn't even know how much time had passed. Everything that could have gone wrong did, and then all of the solutions were just a little too convenient. At first glance, this book looks like a retelling of Robin Hood infused with magic to make it a little more interesting. It had literally nothing to do with Robin Hood except the names and the use of bows and arrows, I felt that it just made the story more confusing. The magic system is flawed and underdeveloped, the characters were flat, and if Marianne giggled nervously at an inappropriate moment one more time I was going to scream. Also Marianne absorbed all of Robin Hood's personality and made show more Robbie's character unnecessary. The magic was under explained and there were some many unnecessary characters that were used to attempt to draw out an emotional response that just fell flat. Personally I did not enjoy this book, and would not recommend it to a friend.
Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for providing me a free copy for review. show less

Marianne—or Maz— is invited to the city for her sixteenth birthday. She is a common village girl, an orphan, raising her brother—or so he believes. Once inside the city, she u covers her destiny: that she is an heir to the throne and a powerful sorcerer wants to use her to resurrect an army of the dead. Think Hunger Games meeting Lord of the Rings meeting medieval society with a Star Wars-ian plot twist. I found the book enjoyable, although a little short at 130 pages.

I received a copy of this book for the early reviewer’s program.

The Phantom’s Curse had a decent plot and nice twist at the end, but the writing fell flat for me. The story and characters needed to be fleshed out more, it seemed like the characters accomplished all sorts of seemingly impossible tasks with very little preparation or experience so it was hard for me to believe it which took me out of the story. Relationships too seemed to be formed immediately- if one character was vaguely nice to the main character suddenly they were one of her closest friends.

Overall the Phantom’s Curse is a pretty quick read that is entertaining at times but lacked the depth to become a great novel.

Fantastic book! The only issue I found with it...it's too short! I would've loved to read more, have more world building, or character development.

That being said, the story as a whole was great. Maz is the perfect fierce and vulnerable protagonist. I absolutely adored her. There were plenty of twists that I didn't see coming and the story wrapped up nicely. No open endings and a little bonus content at the end too that helped round out more of the story line.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I plan to buy a finished copy :)

Thank you LibraryThing and BHC Press for the advanced e-copy to read and honestly review.

In The Phantom's Curse by Shelley Wilson, we are introduced to Marianne who is a young healer and her brother Newt. Marianne is responsible for taking care of Newt after their parents are exiled. Unfortunately Newt is accused of stealing and is arrested so Marianne and her new friends must now rescue him. There is alot going on in this book and while I enjoyed the fast pace, I think it might have been a bit better if it had be trimmed down a little. I don't necessarily mean length but maybe the issues could have been edited. I liked the characters and the story but there was a lot thrown in. That being said it was a fun read and I would gladly read more about Marianne and her friends in other books.I received a free copy of this book in show more exchange for an honest review through the early reviewers program. show less