Customer Reviews

Stealing Sacred Fire

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I eagerly awaited the conclusion to this series. The first book completely snared me: The story of half breed twins whose lives are changed for ever by a mysterious stranger. The second,though not as strong as the first, still held my attention. This third however was a disappointment, heavily bogged down in mysticism and self absorbed characters. The story could have been told in 150 pages rather than 400. Not only that, but loose ends are not satisfyingly tied up. The conclusion feels rushed but at the same time overly long. I know I was really hoping that the story would come back to some of the principals in the first book but it doesn't. They are little more then an after thought and the charas that the novel does focus on simply don't engage the reader's sympathy at all. Read the novel to complete the series but don't expect it to have the same verve as the first two books.

I would like to review the Fallen Angels trilogy (STP,SHB,SSF) here. I finished the trilogy in 3 days because the series is addictive despite some of its shortcomings. Stalking Tender Prey (first book) is brilliant once you overcome the rather slow pace in the beginning. STP has all a perfect gothic dark fantasy should have and it is not for those with high moral standards. Its hero (PO) is a disturbing yet alluring amoral character whom you either dislike or care for. I find myself doing the later and the transformation of PO from a demonic character in the first book to almost a god of love in the 3rd book is mesmerizing. The second book delves into the usual good versus evil fantasy realm and hence to me the weakest of the trilogy but still an engrossing read. The concept of the 3rd book, transformation of a divine king in flesh to the ultimate Messiah of mankind, would be a challenge for any writer. But Storm delivers because she is gifted and writes from her heart. Her alternate view of Christianity and salvation is fascinating and almost believable. But like all Storm's books her ending tend to be rushed with all her fascinating views cramped into a few pages. I love the Wraeththu trilogy and of course tend to compare any of Storm's books to it. The Fallen Angel series is not as great but this dark fantasy is still too good to be missed.

Storm's writing is great, but this repeated ordeal of Shemyaza feels like Frodo being told that there is another Ring to melt in another volcano. The Grigori story could well have ended whit the previous novel. We would have been spared the executive manager who suddenly speaks like a taliban would and the Iraqi dictator that renegades Islam for an antediluvian deity.If you can't get real, get plausible,at least!

This third volume in the Grigori Trilogy was, for all it's eloquent prose and glowing descriptions, a let-down compared to the first two volumes. The plot and subplots are all over the map (literally, since the action keeps jumping around from England to the United States to a heavily fictionalized Iraq -- renamed Babylonia here -- to Egypt), too many new characters get introduced at once and it's hard to keep track of all them. I get the feeling that Storm Constantine was writing a non-Christian counterpart to Jenkins and LeHaye's "Left Behind", since the story is ultimately a pagan apocalypse, but it's just as clumsily written as Left Behind (albeit without the blatantly obvious and heavy-handed preaching).

About the only thing interesting is the dramatic change in the main character, the Grigori angel Shemyaza. In the first book we'd met him as the power-grabbing Peveral Othmann who sought to uncover the mysteries of a Grigori stronghold and use it's power for his own designs; in the second he had become his true self and had grudgingly started to take up his role as a messianic figure. In the third, he slowly lets go his inhibitions and self-doubt and fully embraces his role. But I couldn't help wondering the whole time: is it really worth following him on this cosmic journey? Everything around him just seemed contrived, and many of the new characters just seemed wooden. It's not a horrible book, but it is a disappointing end to a promising trilogy.

This book, being the final book in a trilogy about a character who becomes a messiah figure, would have been impossible to write well by most writers published today. This, as well as the fact that the writer is coming from a Pagan background, makes it doubly hard. You need to read the first two books in the trilogy to understand what she has done in this novel. Stealing Sacred Fire is the most esoterical of the three, but also the most complex in regards to what it has to say about all religions. I highly recommend it and feel that this was how the journey had to end.