Posting a full review here feels way too much like tooting my own horn, but today’s review is special. Last Friday, my oldest son job shadowed me as I went about my day as an author. He learned about free writing, work/life balance, drafting, and marketing.

Watching an author work is awkward for the author and boring for the watcher. The best way to experience what any job is like is to try it. And … since he is my perfect target audience and has already read my book, teaching him how to write a book review was the ideal exercise to learn how to draft out a new project. Even better, he’s thrilled to have his work published here on the blog.

Here’s his review of my book, which is it’s own special kind of adorable.

Stonebearer’s Betrayal Book Review

by Timothy Milner

Stonebearers Betrayal is a fantasy book about a girl named Katira and her friends who get wrapped up in this adventure featuring magic, demons, travel stones, magic stones, an alternate reality, and a creepy old guy who kidnaps her for a couple days. Not as creepy as it sounds, just a bit creepy.

Though there’s a bit of bias in this statement, I love this book.  The sense of adventure and danger really puts this book in a special category, so much so that some would call it a “underrated masterpiece.” Stonebearer’s Betrayal does a magnificent job at conveying emotions. It makes you feel like they’re going to die or feel like she’ll never escape.

I’m not sure about what I don’t like about this book, other than the fact that some of the concepts are a bit creepy. Although I didn’t really like the creepiness factor, I’m sure that others would. It makes the main villain feel even more powerful and demonic.

In stories, it’s usually very important to make the villain feel powerful, make it look like the odds for success are low. You don’t want a story with a wimpy villain, right? If the villain is easily defeated and the heroes go home to celebrate, then there isn’t much story to begin with, especially at the climax. And this is what Stonebearer’s Betrayal does very well.

I’d rate it for people 13+, because anyone below that won’t really understand or respect it. I’m not sure what it’s similar to, I want to say it’s a bit similar to Eragon by Christopher Paolini, but I’m not sure.

About today’s reviewer –

Timothy Milner is a 13-year-old who is way too mature for his age, but nonetheless, he likes to nuke things from orbit, design TNT machine guns, and die to the goddamn triple spike at 53%. Did he mention he was a gamer?

***

Do you like dragons? Good news! I’m working on several dragon projects at the moment. Two of these are short stories that will appear in anthologies and one is a middle grade novel that I’m co-writing with friend and fellow Immortal Works author, Daniel Swenson.

Written as part research, and part fun, check out my article “Symbology of Dragons” I wrote for Amy Beatty about the significance of dragons in different cultures around the world.

***

Thanks for joining us today! If you’d like to be notified of future posts, be sure to ‘subscribe’ using the handy links.

You can also find updates and post notifications on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram – chose the one you like the most!