Author : Kate Constable
Series : Chanters of Tremaris, #1
Paperback : 320 pages
ISBN : 0439554799
(ISBN13: 9780439554794)
My Rating : ★★★★☆
Book Discription : Aussie author Kate Constable has brought a music inspired fantasy to the States that is on a par with celebrated works like Edith Pattou's East, and The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman.
In The Singer of All Songs, young Calwyn is a Daughter of Tarsis, an order of priestesses who have mastered the ice call--a singing power over cold and frost. She lives with her sisters behind an enormous wall of ice that separates their small valley from hostile neighbors in the tensely divided lands of Tremaris. This seemingly impervious barrier is breached by a wounded "Outlander" named Darrow, who comes to the priestesses with a wild tale about an evil Sorcerer named Samis who has sworn to learn the Nine Chantments of the separate lands of Tremaris so that he can rule them as the powerful Singer of All Songs. When the elder priestesses dismiss his rantings and ord! er his sacrifice to the Goddess, Calwyn becomes determined to save his life and join his quest. Together, the two new friends travel into dangerous territories, assembling a rag tag crew of comrades along the way who agree to help prevent Samis from mastering the Nine Chantments.
My Thoughts : This book is more like 4 and a half star, but there was something that bothered in the end. Here goes the riview.
I had high hopes for this series. The author is Austrailian and it was a first for me. (it might be odd to be intrigued by a nationality but, come on! it is quite amazing!)
It wasn't about vampire, warewolf or any kind magic I've heard of before. It's about people with gifts, chanting the words like a song to bring out the power that they were learned to do from a very young age. I have this image in my head where people will sing beautiful tunes in order to save the world. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Because I believe that a song, when sang with a soul, is more powerful than spoken words itself.
When reading this book, author often writes sentences like "even now she wouldn't forget the scream from that night" (not her exact words) but those phrases made me feel like I was reading some sort of a fairy tale or a folk lore.
Also, I was amazed how much excitment was stuffedd into such a small book without the stories being underdevelopped. It was very fast paced and sometimes time flew by with a blink of an eye. But it was more or less very reasonable.
The heroine was, strange at times for me. Needless to say she was my least favorite character. But rest assure, there are plenty of interesting characters that you want to engage in.
At the end of the book, there was a part where I got confused of who the speaker was. I felt like it got side tracked for few pages. And the ending was.. well, not surprising.
But all in all, it was a great book. Filled with fellowship, love, magic and a bit of sorrow. I'm very glad to have stumbled onto this book and can't wait for the second and the third book to be delivered !!
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