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Dark (The Dark Trilogy #1)

Paul L. Arvidson

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Feb 14, 2021 Susan rated it really liked it

Shelves: action-adventure, sf, aliens, audiobook, 4review, fantasy, alien-civs

Dark is a fun mix of fantasy and science fiction. The story starts us off on a quest with a crew of quaint, mannerly people who have shamans and a little spiritual or ritualist magic. The quest leads them further and further afield and each new encounter shifts the world a bit. More and more tech enters the scene and by the end, we a solid science fiction tale happening.

Dun is our main character and he’s just coming of age, an apprentice shaman to his people (the Bridge Folk). Their rivers are d Dark is a fun mix of fantasy and science fiction. The story starts us off on a quest with a crew of quaint, mannerly people who have shamans and a little spiritual or ritualist magic. The quest leads them further and further afield and each new encounter shifts the world a bit. More and more tech enters the scene and by the end, we a solid science fiction tale happening.

Dun is our main character and he’s just coming of age, an apprentice shaman to his people (the Bridge Folk). Their rivers are drying up & that means no fish which will mean eventual starvation. Someone must find the reason for this and fix it, if possible. This quest falls on his shoulders and he’s happy to take it on as it gives him the chance to find out what happened to his father, who left many years ago on his own quest. Along the way, they (Dun. Padj, and Tali) meets others. Among these, I found Myrch to be the most interesting. He’s not like Dun and his other companions in stature or mindset. In fact, he’s a bit shady. He certainly seems to know more than he lets on and that keeps his companions guessing about his true purpose.

Tali was a good addition to the group from the start because she’s an alchemist. This means she’s got healer skills as well as some chemical weapons up her sleeves. I also liked that she was so down to earth, keeping the guys grounded and on target.

Here and there in the story we get some observation notes, as if a scientist is able to peek in on our adventurers and is keeping tabs on them. This gives us some good hints that this is indeed a science fiction tale and it’s just most of our characters don’t know much of science… and any sufficiently advanced technology appears as magic, right? We also get hints as to what kind of species Dun and his folk might be, such as having fur and not being very tall.

The Chakka people were the most disturbing to me, being deliciously creepy indeed! They all seem to be afflicted by some ailment or injury. Tali isn’t exactly sure of the source of their misery but she does her best to help. Meanwhile the story gives us hints of who the meanspirited Overlords might be, though Dun has never met one. In fact, later in the story when the action heats up and there’s some real danger, Dun kind of goes around asking ever so politely, ‘Are you an Overlord?’ to anyone who is particularly cruel. Really, it’s quite quaint and charming.

The story over all has a gentle ramble for the bulk of it. It’s a little slow here and there, though enough troublesome things happen to keep me interested in the welfare of the main characters. Finally, in the last fifth of the book we get some real action with some real consequences. It seems that as more and more tech enters the story, the pacing picks up until by the end we are just going full speed. In fact, one newish character dies and I was like, ‘Hey! What? How?’ I felt I needed a bit more info or build up or some suspense. The death leaves Dun shattered but that seems a bit forced to me because he didn’t know this person long at all, and we readers knew them even less. So there’s no real emotional impact at the end for me. The story does leave everything on a cliffhanger on the edge of a battle. Overall, it was fun. 4/5 stars.

The Narration: Benjamin Fife was a great pick for Dun, sounding like a polite young man who will have his patience and courtesy put to the test again and again. Fife’s female voices sounded like ladies and he various voices for all the characters so that each was distinct. He added in just a handful of sound effects in the second half of the book, like for chattering teeth (which was definitely spooky in a few scenes, as intended) and a few horn sounds too. They worked good with the narration & didn’t drown it out. The pacing was good with the exception of a few odd pauses in the last fifth or sixth of the book, though I was pretty wrapped up in the story at that point so they didn’t matter much. Overall, 4.5/5 stars.

I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Paul L. Arvidson. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it. ...more

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Mar 23, 2022 Paul Arvidson rated it it was amazing · (Review from the author)

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