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From: "Yotna El'toub" <yotna_eltoub@hotmail.com>
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Subject: {ASSM} {REVIEW} Review 007 Sangrelysia (so far)  by Vivian Darkbloom
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Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 15:10:03 -0500
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Review 007 Sangrelysia [a work in progress] by Vivian Darkbloom
           Chapters 1 to 12

Storyline

<Brief outline only>

The land of Sangrelysia has troubles. By rights it should be a
place of wonder and joy, but a foolish King is enthroned. Fool
enough is he to covet other lands, and invent spurious wars in
order to conquer them.

So all is lost? No there is an intelligent wizard with a back
bone, and the hope of a fair and equitable leader in his
apprentice - the Princess. Still it will be no easy task to
turn the foolish from the path of destruction.

Will good succeed over thoughtless greed? Well you, like I, will
have to wait to find out, as this is a review of a part finished
story.

Vivian's own preface give us an excellent feel for the place,
and a hint of the barb in the tale (intentional). :-)

"Sangrelysia is a land somewhere between Shangri-La and the
Elysian fields, where magic still happens and mythical beasts
still abound, but not a place without its troubles - "issues"
which (fancy that!) might resemble those we humble mortals face
in the world we presently refer to as "reality." Oh, and sex."


Merits

<What was worthy of comment>

Much, but one thing must be clear - this story will annoy some
for the self same reason it delights me. The King and his
habits may resemble someone we all know and... Well we all know,
anyway.

Depending on your view of satire (I love satire) and your
'political' stance (mine accords well with the story) this is
either; an enjoyable and well written 'poke in the eye', or an
outrage. Me, just pass me that wand, I want a poke too!

OK, fair warning given to the very people who most need to read
and understand the story, but almost certainly will not. At
least not both.

But there is so much more, the magical and fantastical parts of
this are well thought out and planned. I suspect the author is
well versed in Fantasy stories. This shows in the flight
away from the Palace, excerpt below:

<Encircling us, towering overhead, dark leaves of the forest
canopy occluded the light of the sky, which itself was overcast
with ominous grey. High above, a large, black bird with ragged
wings disappeared into the foliage. I peered as deeply as I
could between the branches, but could discern only darkness. An
eerie silence lingered uneasily all around, clung to the chilly
breeze. The prickling sensation of unseen eyes watching from the
concealed depths. I shivered.

Poor Vianne was going crazy, stomping and pacing. I strode over
and took her halter from the page who was struggling with her as
well as her own horse. One of the horses had bolted, running
back the way we came, and its rider was attempting to persuade
it to return to the group.

I turned to Roderick. "You're still sure you don't want to go
the other way?">

There are the delights of the wizard effortlessly, and magically
transporting himself around the Palace Court while critiquing
the King - to the complete befuddlement of the 'hired help'.
A door knocker that has to be seen to be believed, and much
else that is humorous.

But our author comes into her own when she describes the
emotions of our nameless brave wizard. The loss he feels for his
once great and peaceful Country. The regret in him that he was
too passive, and too secure - he could have prevented the
change; if only he had believed it could actually happen.
Excerpt below:

<The Sangrelysia of my youth was pointedly carefree. We went out
of our way to indulge in reckless abandon. It was our mission,
our accomplishment. I grew up knowing about the dark secrets,
books filled with spells cast to cause pain and submission, but
why would I want to fill my head with such things?

It wasn't until disaster struck that I found myself desperately
skimming such tedious, grey dusty volumes, clad in the
spiderwebs of neglect. I sat in my tower frantically seeking to
fill in the gaps. Into the shadows I had gazed, as far as I
could, but still nothing. Never before had I needed to look into
the depths of night with such intensity, shadows cast by
invisible demons.>

Powerful stuff, with resonances for us all; just because today
is fair, it does not mean we can ignore the approaching storm.

A big merits section, but it's a big story and a bigger subject.


Demerits

<What detracted from the story>

I almost didn't read further than the second paragraph (which
would have been a mistake)I post it below:

<A thin sliver of afternoon sunlight slicing across stale, musty
atmosphere accented the tense silence in the room as I faced the
men seated around the dark wooden table, whose impatient
expressions flew across at me with unbridled hostility. >

Now the writing is fine, but we have a paragraph - with one
full stop! This is a short example of the habit the author has
in extending the sentence to unwieldy proportions. Read it out
aloud, it would make you breathless. In addition the impact of
some fine imagery is thrown away as the lines of text skitter by
you. It is in need of an edit, to break it up, so we can digest
the scene. As I said, this almost stopped me in my tracks, a real
danger for the casual reader - as it is so early in the text.

The habit worsens when we encounter lists. No attempt is made
to punctuate the list and give it a rhythm. So we are left with
a long, dry collection of words. Thankfully the aberrations are
rare, and the rest of the writing so good, that you don't let
them put you off.

Writers tend to fall in love with certain words, in Vivian's
case, in this story it is sycophant. Now not only are they
everywhere, they are never, toadies or brown nosers, lackeys or
sidekicks. They are always sycophants - and the word ends up
jarring you out of the text.


Atmosphere

<How well evolved was the environment> Marks out of  20

<20>

Wonderful well worked and a delight to behold. My first perfect
score!

Workflow

<How well did the story progress and develop> Marks out of  20
<15>

I got a little confused at times, but this is inherent to
writing in the fantasy style. In general the flow is good. I
can't wait to see where it all ends up!


Eroticism

<Just how erotic a read is this (erotic, not sexy!)> Marks out
of  20
<16>

Sex when it comes along is very elegantly handled, the erotic
part of it is mainly in the wizards yearning for the Princess.
This is tied up so nicely to his own desire to be an innocent
once more, that it moves the reader (at least this one).

Mechanics

<The boring bit, grammar, typo's etc.> Marks out of 20
<12>

I'm going to be harsh here, the story is so good, that the
lapses really pulled me out of it, and as a result annoyed me
more. I would love to see this go into the hands of a good
editor.

Impression

<What did I feel having read the story, did I want to read
more?> Marks out of 20
<18>

Oh yes, it's warm, funny and yet deadly serious. I will not only
do a complete review of this when the text is finished, but I
will read more by this author. Colour me impressed.



Total score

81 Yotties out of 100.

Readability guide     00-20 must try harder.
                            20-40 needs development
                            40-60 readable
                            60-80 good read
                            80-99 should read
                           100 reserved for my stories :-)

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Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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