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48 of 50 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Plot, Disappointing Herione, July 12, 2000
This review is from: The Glasswrights' Apprentice (Paperback)
Mindy Klasky's first novel, The Glasswright's Apprentice, tells the story of Rani, a merchant girl in a caste-controlled society whose family sacrifices most of its wealth to buy her way into the guild. The book opens with Rani mostly feeling sorry for herself due to mistreatment by the guild instructors. In a moment of rebellion, she decides not to return to the guild one afternoon after being sent on a errand, and goes instead to the glamorous religious ceremony honoring the realm's prince. In an unfortunate twist of fate she finds herself the accidental accomplice in the assassination of the prince, and a sudden fugitive from the king's justice. She goes into hiding in the city streets both to survive, and with the hope of clearing her name by unraveling the conspiracy that murdered the popular prince. She will discover the conspiracy is far more complex than she would suspect, involving a secret Brotherhood who seem to have members everywhere she turns. I enjoyed the book for the most part. The many twists of the murder conspiracy kept the book interesting and the fantasy kingdom of Morenia, or at least this one city, was well-drawn. However, I had a hard time finding Rani a likeable heroine. As she moves from caste to caste, person to person, throughout the book, she makes and betrays loyalties, steals, lies, and even kills without too much of a backward glance. She also seems to get over too easily the deaths, mutilations and misfortunes that her family and friends suffer in her name. I'm sure we're meant to admire her for her "survive at all costs" attitude, and survive she does, but I found her to be a bit too cold-blooded and self-serving. The end of the book tries to patch more of a conscience onto her character a little too late. Traditional fantasy fans may also be a tad disappointed to discover there isn't a scrap of magic or any fantastic elements to the tale other than that it is set in a fantasy kingdom with its own religion and pantheon of a Thousand Gods. I don't need magic to find a fantasy satisfying, but without it, and without a lovable character to cheer for, too much depends on the plot alone. Still, it is an enjoyable book and an admirable first effort.
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28 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting, ambitious, but ultimately frustrating, August 3, 2000
This review is from: The Glasswrights' Apprentice (Paperback)
Klasky's first novel is set in a single city, rigidly divided into castes. Rani Trader falls afoul of the royal family and must use all her wits to survive. I wanted very much to like this book. I enjoyed the atypical paucity of magic (although, contrary to a few other reviewers' comments, there is a minute amount of magic). Rani is an interesting, resourceful character whose effectiveness as a protagonist is somewhat hampered by her virtual amorality. Yet Klasky doesn't cast Rani as an anti-hero; rather, her deeds are apparently meant to give the impression that Rani is a good person struggling in difficult circumstances. While the social setting was initially intriguingly described, it didn't seem to me that it held up well under scrutiny. I was disappointed by the ease with which Rani moves between the supposedly rigid castes, and I couldn't understand why the ruling family, described as ruthless and calculating, was apparently so vulnerable to outside attack. I also thought that the characters' motives were frequently unclear or unrealistic. Klasky's writing is competent but not stellar. She frequently repeats words or phrases, and uses an enormous number of clunky dialogue attributions. (One character "grunted" two or three times on a single page.) The book was engrossing, although I frequently found myself shaking my head, and I would recommend it primarily to die-hard fantasy fans or to aspiring fantasy authors.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Could Have Been, June 2, 2001
This review is from: The Glasswrights' Apprentice (Paperback)
This book has a lovely cover, and a smart premise. The main character, 13 year old Rani lives in a kingdom with strict castes. Her family, a merchant family manages to buy her into the Glasswright's Guild, a step up the social ladder. However, she's in the wrong place in the wrong time when she witnesses history altering assassination along with a hundred other people. She however, knows more about the assassin than the rest of the populace because the assassins come from her guild. The fantasy world was very interesting with its social system, its castes, and its royalty. The politics thrown in, the monarchy, the guilds, etc. were nice touches that give good situations for neat characters. The lowest caste- the Touched, a couple of Princes, people that died. . .Unfortunately many of the characters weren't as fleshed out as I'd liked them to be, but that's probably because the story is told in the point of view of Rani who doesn't seem to be able to judge people all that well. Or because some were killed before they got interesting. I was drawn to Rani's situation as much as her world. She's the underdog, hunted for murder, living by her wits, surviving by being smart. Her talent is in her art of stained glass and recognizing patterns. Unfortunately, you don't see much of that intelligence in her mad dash from one debacle to another. She blunders from one caste to another seeking shelter and family, but after awhile, one would think she'd learn a little so that she wouldn't HAVE to join every underground organization in the city and end up betraying everyone. I don't mind the sort of anti-hero that does anything to survive, kill, betray, lie, steal, etc, but they at least have to know why they're doing it! She reacts to everything and everyone and is used throughout the book with no mitigating twist in the end. She is still as powerless in a most unsatisfying ending. I would still read the sequal because there's enough in the story to make it interesting. The writing is well done and while I didn't like the way Rani handled many things, it could be described as realistic. She IS only 13 and can't be expected to see through all the conspiracies and make all the right decisions, though I'd like to see a *little* triumph in the end. . . I can only hope that the sequal will unveil a much more mature and smart Rani that can manipulate puppet strings as well as she dances from them.
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