Terry Soileau's Blog: TERRY SOILEAU ON WRITING AND LITERATURE - Posts Tagged "fantasy"

The Havenshire Resistance by Diane Rapp

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


AMAZING AND DELIGHTFUL STORY!!

Take a look at the dragon on the cover. You will see it again! I LOVE the cover, and the book only gets better when you delve into it!

If you haven't read Book 1 of the Heir to the Throne series, Chapter 1 of THE HAVENSHIRE RESISTANCE will bring you up to speed and get you into the story. This was an engaging and delightful story and the author's awesome and colorful imagination must have been running at full throttle.

Diane Rapp has a real knack for making a fantasy world real. The characters come alive and there is plenty of action and suspense to propel the reader from chapter to chapter. The attention to detail is remarkable and gives the book a "you are there" quality. I really loved those wolves, especially Kriegen, a wolf-pack leader and I love the way the wolves communicate with humans and with each other with their minds (which is referred to in the book as "mind-speak"). Setting the thoughts out in bold print is a nice touch.

My favorite quote from the wise Kriegen: "Our pack is a small part of wolf society. One day the Council of Elders may agree to meet humans. We must prove humans are worthy to come before them. Some do not believe humans are intelligent and can follow the law. It may take time." My favorite part of the book is when Kriegen the wolf appeared with Queen Krystal before the wolves' Council of Elders at the Bloody Pond to prove that humans are intelligent and can follow the law. Success was absolutely crucial because Queen Krystal needed the Council of Elders to send an army of wolves to help in the upcoming battle at Havenshire.

If you like fantasy novels, you are going to LOVE The Havenshire Resistance! I thoroughly enjoyed it and I recommend it highly. It is the kind of book that is a keeper - the kind you can read over and over again. Don't miss it!



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Michelle Isenhoff has a new fan in me! SONG OF THE MOUNTAIN is a beautiful story, lushly told in rich, descriptive language that is almost poetic. I am a huge fan of Ernest Hemingway, so forgive me for the comparisons. Robert Penn Warren wrote that Hemingway, citing Hemingway's THE SUN ALSO RISES (my favorite novel of all time), was more of a poet that an novelist. The same could be said for the author of SONG OF THE MOUNTAIN, but she certainly is a good storyteller! This book is so well-written, sentence for sentence.

This is an enchanting story with an ancient oriental background and the myths it makes use of are based on or derived from stories from the Bible and perhaps other religions - stories regarding the Creator, the Fall of Man, the Tree Of Good And Evil, and a saving tree (such as the Cross of Christ). These elements went into this elaborately and ingeniously dreamed up story.

This story features a young boy and the old guru who raised him. Their relationship reminds me of the relationship between the old fisherman, Santiago, and the young boy who fishes with him and keeps him company and looks after him, Manolin, in Hemingway's THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA. This book is also, thanks to Michelle Isenhoff, tempting me to read KIM, by Rudyard Kipling. KIM also features a young boy who lives with an old Tibetan lama. Yes, that Kipling book is on my table. That is one thing about really good books - they tend to make you want to read other really good books. So, I guess I am going to have to peruse the Isenhoff bookshelf for other goodies. I have a feeling I won't be disappointed.

I loved SONG OF THE MOUNTAIN, and I highly recommend it for Middlegraders and even older folks.