Beautiful Story

This story is charming, well written with excellent characterisations. The narration is good, but female voices can be a bit irritating. Despite that much better than other's I have listened to.

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3 people found this helpful

loved.. loved. loved

loved the story.. The narration was excellent...I am about to download the next book in the series

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Songs of The Earth

Having been taken in by the book's description in which it is compared to 'The Name of the Wind' I had expected a book of a similar, if not the same, caliber. Unfortunately, as I'm sure you can tell from my rating, I was sorely disappointed.



The characters are so bland and flat that a two dimensional shape would feel pangs of jealousy. Due to his lack of any depth the protagonist, Gair, is simply impossible to like. Not that you'll dislike him either; that would require him to have some sort of personality. He simply exists. While the motivations and feelings of other characters are delved into with slightly more success the descriptions ultimately fail to bring any of them to life.



The plot would be passable were concepts not taken almost directly, 'cookie cutter' style, from other fantasy titles and real history and then stitched awkwardly together. Perhaps I am being slightly too harsh and dismissive in that the plot of the book could have been acceptable had it not been poorly executed. That to me is the crux of the matter, I simply could not stand the trudging, simplistic style.



I am sure there are some out there who will love this book but it's simply not for me and I was exceptionally glad to see the end of it.



That all being said Allan Corduner, the narrator, did a fine job however not even his valiant attempt could save this audiobook for me.

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12 people found this helpful

Disappointing book, sorry (beautifully read thoug)

I came looking for excellent (female-authored) fantasy: a good story and well written (female) characters but ended up giving up 2/3 of the way through (before the twist mentioned by some reviewers).

The characters were largely bland and uninteresting, the most gripping sections for me were those not focused on any of the main characters. I was especially disappointed to find that none of the female characters got "POV" sections til more than halfway through, and were all described entirely from a (horny teenage male) viewpoint and poorly fleshed out.

I liked the idea behind the magic system of "music", it's new to me if not necessarily original, but the world building was one trope after another and sat uncomfortably together.

And then there's the sexual relationship with a truly horrible power dynamic which dominates the middle third or so of the book (and maybe beyond). I don't have a problem with sex in fantasy but this particular relationship was the final straw for me.

That said Allan Corduner is one of my favourite narrators and did a fantastic job as always.

I really wanted to like this, I hate being negative about books but sadly it wasn't to be so.

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Fantasy Flop

No matter how long I listened, no spark came. Fantasy is vast, and I expect to be transported, dazzled by the author's fantasy world. This was a damp dishrag. Sorry

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8 people found this helpful

this is a terrible book

I read bad books. I love bad books. And so when I say this is was a terrible book, I really mean it. Honestly, listening to this it is quintessentially like hearing an abridged online guide to 'writing a fantasy cliche for retarded homeless children'. The characters are stolen. The plot is stolen. The style is stolen. The only thing which might not have been stolen is the money that I paid to listen to this terrible drivel. As far as I can see the only reason no one is suing Elspeth Cooper for plagiarism is the fact that she is such a terrible writer that everything she has ripped off has been so terribly mutilated that it would be unrecognisable in court,

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9 people found this helpful

Not at all what I expected!

I couldn't listen to anymore, just an overdose on his lust for her, or her lust for him, how gorgeous her skin was, or how ripped he was. Really! I made it to chapter 28 I think and had to switch it off, if it gets better after that, then great for those who dont mind, or even like, this sort of thing. To me it became monotinous to a point of distraction. Cross between the worst of Twighlight and a bad teenage hormonal crush with pirates wanting to be Mr Grey, but even more held back!
Will not be purchasing any others in the series as my expectations from the title and synopsis were sadly but definitely not met.
Have to say though, Allan Corduner was great, really liked his voice, don't think I would have made it this far without him, so cheers Mr Corduner.

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1 person found this helpful

Underwhelmed

The narration was excellent, but the story seemed to be made of bits from other books. There is no thread or continuity as the tale seems to jump about all over the place. Add to that having to skip through what seemed to be a lot sex, I finally gave up and never finished the book, sorry!

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