Great speaker, semi-great story

I bought this book because I really liked Patrick Harveys voice. He still does not reach quite the same level as the speakers of the first three books did, because he did mispronounce some of the character's names which the other speakers payed really close attention to get right. But he still did quite a good job and I will look out for more works from him.

The story itself sounded really interesting to me and I really enjoyed the first half of it. But the further I got the more the story seemed to be made up. It seemed so far away from the rules of the previous books, for example what the Tribe could do and where their limits are. Or how easily Sunaomi could controll his powers compared to Takeo before and there was no explanation or questioning of how that new powers actually worked. And let alone that they just let Hisao go as if nothing had happend. That was really not how things would have gone in Takeos story. So I was quite disappointed. But maybe I will give the next book a try.

Sie haben diese Rezension bewertet.

Wir haben Ihre Meldung erhalten und werden die Rezension prüfen.

I am in two minds about this title...

I have to say before continuing that I love the tales of the Otori series, especially part 0-3, less so book 4.

Orphan Warriors throws you in some time after Takeo's death and it feels quite... aimless to me for the greatest part of the book.

The topic of intruige and war does not appear to have been the main focus of Lian Hearn in this book, the tribe skills are all of a sudden very much more diverse and where you had some fixed skills and rules in Takeo's series there is a completely new set of abilities here which feels is being extended as is necessary to fit around the story.

It appears every character in the book has a goal except the protagonist/ main character who just doesn't seem to act the way a human would and that is unfortunately the best way for me to describe it.

Whereas Takeo has a certain goal throughout every single page in the books and his views and personality are explained from his own perspective this does not feel to be the same here.
It feels more like a summary of what the story could be like with quick jumps from one location and situation to the next without filling it with enough context.

There is a real multitude of various characters with different motivations and relations as already known by readers of the old Otori books, however at times it felt to me as if information was just piled over the reader to give enough relevance to the character.
To me that had the effect of not actually making me interested in most of them as they seemed rather bland and boring at times.

Most disappointing to me is the flatness of the characters. In the old series I cared about what happened to most characters one way or the other, either liking or disliking them.
Here the antagonist is bland and uninteresting without any other real motive but madness.
Whereas Iida appeared villanous and Fujiwara obsessed and morbid this antagonist is just a stereotypical evil madman lacking any deeper motivation.

Adding that to the lack of a goal or drive by the protagonist made me feel like swimming in a sea of relationships, names and ghostly tribe skills without any interest wether or not I was gonna sink or not. Just towards the 2/3 of the book I had developed any actual interest in the main characters ongoing fate.

The narrator is not bad, however I feel like he is trying to enact gruffness in his voice too much for most characters and is not really comparable to the skill of Aiko Nakasone and Keving Grey, the narrators of the original series.

Despite all that I still kind of enjoyed the book. I cannot really understand as to why I enjoyed it as it lacked most of what I would have enjoyed in the book but that may have just been a disparity in expectations and reality.

I defenitely recommend reading/listening to it despite all that and encourage everyone to make up their own mind about it.
As for me, I will buy the next part aswell as after the book ends the protagonist has grown to me a little.
Happy listening!

Sie haben diese Rezension bewertet.

Wir haben Ihre Meldung erhalten und werden die Rezension prüfen.

1 Person fand das hilfreich

Not as good as the „Takeo-Books“

I listened to the whole story and really do think that the Takeo-Books are better. This story was more „fantastical“, which was not to my taste.

I did not really feel comfortable with the narrator either. I listened to the Takeo-Books first and got accustomed to his pronunciation of the names.
The narrator of this book has a different accent and pronounces the names differently, which made me half mad listening. Kaede is the most prominent example.
The distinctive „Japan-feeling“, that I had listening to the Takeo-Books got lost in this one.

Sie haben diese Rezension bewertet.

Wir haben Ihre Meldung erhalten und werden die Rezension prüfen.