Customer Reviews

The Tower of Shadows

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Unfortunately, I'm still scratching my head trying to figure out how this book got such good blurbs from established writers. It's basically just a series of fight scenes held together by a very thin, disjointed narrative thread, with two-dimensional characters and a very shallow backstory.

Bowling would have used his time and space much more wisely if he had spent more of it developing the characters and plot, which was basically that the survivor of a massacre (by demons?) is trying to find his brother and use his blood to gain power, supposedly to avenge their parents' murder. He couldn't even be bothered to come up with original names, filching Ariel from Shakespeare for one of the world's gods, and the name of the knight who magically appears out of nowhere whenever the characters are in a tight spot is priceless - Sir Lancet Rhymewind. The main characters are the "good" brother who is the target, a reluctant wizard with poor self-esteem, an embittered and cynical ex-warrior, and his plucky daughter. Yawn. I couldn't bring myself to really care about any of them, and what ever happened to Kayla's artistic talent, anyway? That was a promising trait that piqued some interest in me at the beginning, but then it was just dropped.

The author has some nice descriptive touches in his writing (although "the sky was the color of a clotting wound" is _not_ one of them), and perhaps he can do better in future books, but I felt that this one was just a waste of my time.

Tower of Shadows is a solid fantasy tale full of ingredients we know and love: swordfights, magicians, demons, tortured heroes, spunky heroines and yes, even a dragon. But despite these familiar fantasy elements, Bowling's descriptions make the book unique. I was particularly fond of Lantern Watch, a town created when two pirate ships and a merchant vessel crash on a rocky coast and the survivors build a village within and around the wrecked skeletons of their ships.

Some of the descriptions are a little on the gory side - vaguely reminiscent of The Briar King by Greg Keyes, in my opinion. But that's not a bad thing, and I'd say the book is still appropriate for teens (even though it doesn't appear to be marketed strictly as YA).

And you've got to admire Bowling for cranking out (and publishing) a novel while in school. That's no easy task!

The Tower of Shadows was an entertaining story. Its a straightforward tale:

-A man trying to keep his daughter safe from his past, while beholden to answer when that past comes calling.

-A wizard's young untried apprentice charged with carrying out the duties his master is no longer able to.

-A young man unaware of his role in terrible events that are unfolding around him.

The author is a young man, a college student. While he still has room to grow he spins a fun tale. He does have a love of similes, but he makes them interesting and rarely dull. Through most of the book each chapter is devoted to one of the various viewpoint characters until we approach the final section of the book. From this point on the author switches between all of the various viewpoints from page to page, sometimes paragraph to paragraph. While this makes the ending a little more disjointed than it should have been the author makes it clear when he is making a viewpoint switch and to which character he is switching to.

Overall, though I enjoyed the book and look forward to seeing where the author will take the story in the next installment.

This is a typical fantasy novel - you have star-crossed twins, separated at birth, one a hero, one evil, you have the journey to set things to rights. Magic, horses, adventure...

And all of it is done well enough to make the story a quick read, a pleasant read. It's a fun book.

The problem is that it's not memorable - things are a bit too typical here, the story a bit too much like things I've read before. The characters don't linger, either. I read the book, and a few months later, saw it on the shelf and had to glance at the first few pages again to realize that I'd read it already. Not a good sign.

If you're looking for a quick fantasy read that's fun, go for it. If you're expecting a new author of a new complex series (like Rothfuss, Lynch, Abercrombie), you might want to pass.

Its a good start. It does what a book is supposed to do, keep you entertained and entranced until you finish the end. The only thing is the ending seems rushed and there wasn't much development of the background of the story and of some of the characters.

Take Rand al'Thor from Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (or any other young hero archetype), drop in a few hints of Tolkien, and sprinkle with the stock characters you find in any number of fantasy novels. Shake lightly. What you would end up with is THE TOWER OF SHADOWS.

Lest the above paragraph seems too harsh, it should be kept in mind that author Drew Bowling is a college student and began his work on this novel while still in high school. That is a great achievement. And though THE TOWER OF SHADOWS may be just an amalgam of other fantasy works, well, most of them are. They tend to be built on similar molds.

What matters is what you do with your creations and how you develop your voice. Bowling, in the end, stands on his own merits.

Corin Starcross is the young hero, saved as a child by Dale, a wizard, and Wren Tident, a mercenary. Corin, however, has a brother, Cade, who was not rescued by the two would-be heroes and he sets out on the path for vengeance, determined to take out those who have murdered his parents. With sorcery as his guide, Cade seeks to call out the greatest of all demons, Apollyon. But to do so he must spill the blood of his own brother.

Cade sends assassins to bring Corin to him while Dale maneuvers his own pawns into place to protect the young boy. As is the way of things, nothing ever goes as planned, and eventually Corin and Cade meet face to face to settle the matter. Along the way, friends will struggle, some will fall, and those in that mysterious netherworld between childhood and adulthood must step up and come of age.

While the elements of the story itself are average, Bowling does possess a solid voice and thus is able to make the tale much more interesting. Fantasy aside, Bowling does very well with the more horrific imaginings, and it's nice to see that he does not stick to the convention that heroes are unbeatable. He does a fantastic job with the creation of and resolutions for the character of Wren.

As a first novel, THE TOWER OF SHADOWS succeeds for a couple of reasons. It is a quick-paced adventure story with a very visual style. The world of Ellynrie has some wonderful elements and leaves much more to be explored with future works. It also provides a glimpse into what Bowling may be able to do in the years to come as he further defines his voice. But perhaps the greatest thing about the book is the author's youth.

It's a difficult thing to keep one's sense of the magical and the mythical fresh and unjaded as time passes. It's an odd paradox that many readers expect their fantasy to be realistic and the fantastic must be explained, thus losing its magic. Bowling's vision in THE TOWER OF SHADOWS is not yet clouded, and his expression of wonder and fantasy are untainted and pure. It takes us back to a time when stories were fun and when magic was just magic. And we accepted it as such because we, too, were young.

--- Reviewed by Stephen Hubbard

I was surprised while reading this book for it turned out to be quite an entertaining tale. I thought the description was wonderful and the plot was interesting enough for a first novel, although a bit unclear at times. However, I felt that the story overall did indeed feel rushed. For a second novel, the author should take his time and slow down the pace. Also, get deeper into the characters.

The Tower of Shadows
By Drew C. Bowling
In Drew C. Bowlings book, Tower of Shadows, Cade Starcross, after being supposedly dead, resurfaces. He swears revenge on the nameless demon that killed his parents and his childhood home. To accomplish this monumental task, Cade needs a dagger wrought by the gods themselves, and his brother, Corin Starcross, whose blood needs to be spilt. All that stand between Cade and his goal that could dystroy the world are three people, Wren Trident, ex-mercenary, Kayla Trident, stubborn daughter of Wren, and Adrial, apprentis of the wizard Dale.
For me, The Tower of Shadows was an edge-of-your-seat read, filled with action, tragedy, and terror. I found myself crying when Dusty, Corins friend, was killed and cringing with terror when the dragon came. Although the character jumping can get a bit confusing it doesn't detract from the book too much. The Tower of Shadows is a book for anyone who likes fantasy, but doesn't mind a little terror.

Ryan Magee
6th grade
Cascade Middle School
Bend,Or

Technically, neither of the Starcross brothers should have survived the massacre that night. The night the magician, Dale, interrupted a dark ritual, and the monsters destroyed the town. Had it not been for Wren Tident and his pregnant wife, Lori, no one would have been there to save baby Corin from the monster who devoured his parents. His older brother, Cade, is left for dead in the tower of flames that was the Starcross home.

Fast-forward some sixteen years.

Wren Tident is a single father. After having tragically lost his wife, he has given up adventures. He's intent only on the safety and welfare of his daughter, Kayla. Kayla finds him to be overbearing and overprotective, but distant. She's heard stories of her father from before she was born, and she has a hard time believing that the daring, exciting, almost carefree Wren Tident could be the same man she lives with.

Dale has become a bit of a recluse. With the exception of the training of his apprentice, Adriel. Dale and Wren have had very little communication since they parted ways many years ago. While they were close friends once, Wren now prefers the lack of contact.

Corin lives in the countryside, where he was raised by an uncle. He has lived, to this point, a simple and relatively quiet existence. Despite being an orphan and a cripple (one leg is permanently lame thanks to the events of the night he lost his parents) he is a curious and generally cheerful young man.

They are all being hunted.

Survival requires Wren to re-enter the dangerous lifestyle he abandoned for the sake of his daughter. And he'll have to drag Kayla in, too, not that she requires much convincing. It means that old friends, turned enemies, will have to reconnect. It means danger and loss and sacrifice and faith in each other at the darkest of moments. To save themselves, and the world around them, they will have to face the darkness that has taken over the boy who was left for dead. And Cade Starcross does not intend to lose.

Such completely absorbing fantasy that you won't want to come up for air. And when you've finished, you'll want to go back and read it again to see what you might have missed. Thankfully, this is intended to be only the first book. What I'd really like to read, though, is the story of the time in between. There is a big chunk of time missing between the prologue and the beginning of this piece of the story. That was the only thing I found lacking in this book. I want to know how and why everyone got to where the story starts. I guess I just liked these people, the world they live in, and their story so much that I want to know more about all of it!

Reviewed by: Carrie Spellman

It's apparent that this was written by someone with limited writing experience. It's a good story, but it's written poorly. I could hardly enjoy reading it as I couldn't get past the structure of it. Great for pre-teens though, not as well written as Eragon or Harry Potter series.