Scriber [Kindle Edition]

Ben S. Dobson (Author)

Book Description

Disgraced scholar Dennon Lark only wants to be left alone in his self-imposed exile—an exile that ends when a rebel army wielding impossible powers launches a series of brutal attacks on villages across the Kingsland.

Forced from his home, Dennon is drawn back into a world he wants nothing to do with. His research into the kingdom's lost past—the very research that sent him into hiding—may hold the answers to a great many questions about the rebels. Questions about their shadowy motives; about their mysterious abilities; and about their ever-increasing numbers, constantly bolstered by those thought killed in their attacks. And only the King's infamous warrior niece Bryndine Errynson and her company of female soldiers trust him enough to help him find the truth before the rebels burn the Kingsland to the ground.

Following a trail of historical clues across the kingdom and pursued by forces they don't fully understand, Dennon and Bryndine may be the realm's only hope. But in order to preserve the Kingsland's future, they must first uncover its past.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Scriber is an epic fantasy that manages to deliver freshness, deftness, and a fair dose of gender sensitivity to the genre's tropes... the story works itself to a glorious and emotionally-charged climax."  - Adarna SF

"The characters were intensely likeable... the plot was captivating and enthralling." - The Akamai Reader

"It was nice to lose myself in a well written adventure." - Brightdreamer's Book Review

About the Author

Ben S. Dobson is a Canadian fantasy author from the beautiful province of British Columbia. When he isn't writing books to indulge his lifelong passion for epic tales, he probably can be found playing Dungeons and Dragons, or watching a Joss Whedon show, or something equally geeky.

Product Details

• File Size: 618 KB
• Print Length: 374 pages
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B005P5YOUW
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #59,403 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Maybe My Favorite Fantasy Novel--Seriously December 15, 2011

By Moses Siregar III

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Scriber might be the best fantasy book I've read, or at least it might be my favorite. It's not dense like Erikson or Martin, but it has the two things I always look for and rarely find together: great writing with great storytelling.

The best thing about Scriber is the telling of the tale through the voice of the incredibly flawed scholar Dennon Lark. This is first person epic fantasy, and first person is not easy to pull off, even harder when the lead character is a self-hating wimp. But it works. Brilliantly. One reason it works is because it makes sense that Dennon would be telling you a story since he is a historian--first person often feels artificial, but not this time--and because Dennon's humility helps us root for him. And if you're not sure at first, keep reading. You might find the author stumbling a little bit here and there (or not at all), but if you do, don't worry and just keep reading.

Scriber isn't "high fantasy." No dragons (though the characters curse by saying "Damn it to the Dragon!"), no elves, no magical swords. There are wonderful fantastic elements, though, mostly related to a mysterious semi-undead enemy and nature spirits. The story is unconventional in many ways, but it also sticks to some tried and true fantasy tropes (big heroine, big stakes)--in just the right balance of being both different and familiar. The setting feels medieval and the author writes that flavor well. And it's a true standalone story and a fast read (in the good way).

The story features the scriber and a large band of female soldiers. One of the few issues I had with the book was the abundance of characters in that troop. The women were referred to by first name only and, especially early on, I sometimes had a hard time telling them apart and remembering who was who. Another reviewer recently wrote that this wasn't a problem for him, so that could just be me. I have to say that Sylla was my least favorite; she was believable enough but still a bit one-dimensional, but at least she played a good role. Also, I have to say this: Orya for the win. I loved Orya.

The book has two major characters, Dennon Lark and Bryndine Errynson, the leader of the company of female soldiers. No one else gets fleshed out as much as these two. The one limitation I wish hadn't been in the book is that we never got deep into Bryn's head--because the book was written in first person from Dennon's point of view. Bryndine is a memorable, noble character and so easy to root for. I started playing a paladin in a D&D campaign recently and I had to resist the urge to name the character Bryndine (she's really inspiring). On the flip side, though she was very human, she also had few flaws and she never felt quite as real to me as Dennon did. But that's mostly understandable considering the first person pov. Still, I can't help wondering how great it would've been to be able to take a peek inside the mind of Bryndine.

One of my favorite scenes in the book was a meeting between Bryn and Dennon when they first opened up to each other about their vulnerabilities and soon laughed at them--just a beautiful scene full of believable humanity. This is where I think the author's gift for characterization really shone through.

The story is heavy on dialogue, maybe a little too much for my taste, but at least the dialogue was great. The plot sometimes moves forward in ways that are a little too convenient, but I never cared to nitpick because I was having too much fun. The pacing was excellent, although somewhere around the three-quarters point I though it sped up a little too much (after the big return)--this was the only part of the book that felt out of place with the rest, in my opinion. I thought the fight scenes were good, not great, but this isn't a book about fight scenes.

This is a book about a man struggling against the shame of his past and trying to uncover lost truths about his world's history. It's a book about a colorful band of women warriors. It's a book about a heroine as noble as any you've read. It's full of great worldbuilding, heaps of mystery, and mature, skillful writing. And it finishes with a great crescendo.

As a horribly picky reader, I almost never find books that come this close to being perfect for me. That's one of the reasons why I became a writer myself, because I wanted to at least try to take readers on the kind of journey that I want authors to guide me through, the kind of ride Ben Dobson just led me on. I've talked to Ben some since I started reading his book, but I didn't know him before I picked up Scriber for free in the kindle store.

I just want to be clear in saying that although Ben and I are both independent authors writing in the same genre, and although I only write reviews for the rare books that I love, this review has nothing to do with a prior relationship with the author (we had none, even though he had already read my book and I didn't know it) and everything to do with me loving this outstanding book and wanting to recommend this book to everyone. So this is just a guy named Moses, telling it on the mountain:

I've never found a free or cheap ebook as good as this one. It's fantastic, and I'm so glad to have found a new favorite author. Ben, thanks for a great story told well. And sorry to be selfish, but I really hope you write more books as great as this one.

-Moses Siregar III, author of The Black God's War

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect Fall Read October 16, 2011

By Mirrani

Format:Kindle Edition

Anyone who has played the Myst series on their computer has some idea of what it is like to read Scriber. The beauty of the world before you, one that is almost exactly the same, yet somewhat different from what you know, with a hint of fantasy thrown in and a need to focus on the written word are the real elements that charge your mind as you read. Knowledge in this world is power and while writing things don't make them happen as they do in the Myst series, the struggle to find what was once lost reminds one of searching the worlds in hopes of finding some clue to the next step in the journey.

This is an ancient-style world of kings and their armies who travel by horseback, but the people are not lost in their education. Schooling is important, or it was before a certain part in history where learning (and books) were banned. Scribes have survived this time and have knowledge of healing, history and warfare. Their word is almost as much a part of the law as the king's and the telling of this story through the eyes of one famous Scriber makes the tale so real to the heart that it is as if everything unfolds right before your eyes, in true, three dimensional visions.

If I was to worry about anything, it was that the main character was slightly too centered on all of his faults, but that was easily outweighed by the trueness of all of the characters to each other and to their situations. The light fantasy left me craving more of the history of this land, desperately clinging to what was said in an attempt to draw out every last bit of knowledge to complete everything that could not be told in one book. This is as it should be, something to make a Scriber proud.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Fast-paced, contained, glorious December 10, 2011

By C. Mariano

Format:Kindle Edition

(Cross-posted from the Adarna SF book blog)

Despite being firmly of the medieval European vein, Scriber is an epic fantasy that manages to deliver freshness, deftness, and a fair dose of gender sensitivity to the genre's tropes. It moves from mystery/scavenger hunt to epic battle to morality tale but does it in an effective and seamless way.

What first drew me to it was the choice of Dennon Lark, a historian, as the narrator. A fitting choice given his profession, though he is far from the kind of protagonist that most epic fantasies require. Dennon spends far too much time being afraid of his own shadow. His cowardice is often mentioned in the book -- from his desire to hide from the world after a personal endeavor turns tragic to his fear of Sylla, the self-appointed bodyguard of Bryndine Errynson.

A counterpoint to him is Bryndine, niece to the King and generally shunned to Hester Prynne-like proportions as a blasphemer for taking up arms and leading a company of female soldiers. She is the story's heroic trope, given bulk and battle ferocity to make her appear physically unattractive, but with a steadiness of character and purpose that made me cheer for her at every turn. Her actions are tolerated only because she is of noble blood and even among people she saves, she is neither admired nor thanked. Turn Bryndine male and the character loses much of its vulnerability and pathos.

I like how Mr Dobson gives us protagonists we can get behind and uses both Dennon and Bryndine to show different kinds of bravery, different kinds of battles, different kinds of heroes.

Even the warrior women are given nuanced roles. There are about twenty of them but the author knew how to write for them, how to introduce them to the reader so that you are never overwhelmed. Mr Dobson made sure that you paid attention to the right ones at the right times. One that particularly stood out was Wynne, with her hopefulness and desire for learning, and at the end of the book I really did feel as if I were part of this company.

I felt completely immersed in this world. Here, scribers like Dennon are tasked with recovering the kingdom's forgotten history, lost during a Forgetting instigated by a King who had razed all books and knowledge to the ground. It's a monumental task but one that Dennon approaches with passion and devotion, and snippets of all that he has discovered, as we ll as his thoughts, are revealed in brief passages before each chapter. But in spite of this, the world-building in Scriber is never bulky. In fact, I would go out on a limb and say that every detail mentioned had something to contribute to the plot and wasn't just included for flavor or scene-setting. (Let me know if I'm wrong.) Every little thing seemed to matter; nothing felt wasted.

I'm always up for a good series, but I'm a reader who is more impressed when a story wraps itself up satisfyingly in just one take. My only real concern with Scriber was how quickly the characters seemed to jump to conclusions while putting clues together. But that is little compared to how the story works itself to a glorious and emotionally-charged climax. Scriber ticks all the right boxes and reminds me that with indie releases like this, epic fantasy refuses to be just another tired and battle-worn genre.

More About the Author

Ben S. Dobson is a Canadian fantasy author with a hat and plenty of heart. When he isn't writing to indulge his lifelong passion for epic tales, he can probably be found playing Dungeons and Dragons, or watching a Joss Whedon show, or something equally geeky.

You can find him online at these places:
Website: http://bensdobson.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/bensdobson
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/bensdobson
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/bensdobson