The Prophecy of the Stones: A Novel (Hardcover)

by Flavia Bujor (Author) "THE OLD MAN READ THE PASSAGE IN THE PROPHECY once more and nodded solemnly..." (more)
Key Phrases: Chosen One, Nameless One, Council of Twelve (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal
Grade 7-9-Jade, Amber, and Opal meet for the first time when they are 14 and find that their destinies are inextricably intertwined in some way that they have yet to discover. Each girl possesses a stone that matches her name. These stones have great power and are related to an ancient prophecy about the saving of the Light. The girls embark on a quest to understand their role in life and, in the process, enter the kingdom of Fairytale, where some of the magical beings are good, and some are evil. Another key figure is a knight errant who calls himself the Nameless One, who is also destined to be part of the fulfilling of the Prophecy. This is a long, involved story that often takes on the quality of a B movie. The style is somewhat flat and the voice is very youthful. Characters are constantly explaining situations and history. There is a dependence on magical objects that descend willy-nilly into the story and chance meetings in which the girls and the Nameless One are immediately known and accepted. Dialogue is stiff. While there are some interesting fantastical creatures and plot twists, there are also some very odd elements. Death, for instance, is "on strike" so no one can die. There is a small parallel story of a dying girl in a Paris hospital who has dreams that somehow relate to Jade, Opal, and Amber. The purpose of this device remains fuzzy to the end. Jacket information reveals that the author is 15 years old. While the story is a definite accomplishment for one so young, it is not a polished or mature work of fiction.
Bruce Anne Shook, Mendenhall Middle School, Greensboro, NC
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Gr. 5-8. Bujor's debut novel was a sensation in Europe, garnering lots of attention because the author was 14. This celebrity may be worthy of note (a big media campaign is planned for the U.S.), but the fact is, the book sounds as if it were written by, well, a 14-year-old. The story, set far in the future, starts off well enough. Jade, Amber, and Opal are thrown together because of a prophecy and their possession of stones that allow them to do magic and have psychic powers. In an incredibly long march to stamp out evil, the girls find themselves struggling against hardships and embroiled in battles, including a final bloody one in which "the Chosen One" fights to unite the lands of "Fairytale" and the "Outside" into one realm. If all this isn't enough, Bujor injects a saccharine story about a girl dying in modern-day Paris. The characters are one-dimensional, the plot derivative, and the writing sluggish. So why purchase this? Because of the buzz, which will be heard at libraries, and perhaps for the inspiration it can give young writers. If she can get published . . . Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 9-12
  
• Hardcover: 398 pages
• Publisher: Miramax (April 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786818352
• ISBN-13: 978-0786818358
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (119 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #708,573 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 56 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great feat for 15 year old author, April 12, 2004

By	"popciclegurl87" (Spokane, WA USA) - See all my reviews

The Prophecy of the Stones
Flavia Bujor
New York: Mirimax Books, 2004.
Pg. 288

The first time I saw The Prophecy of the Stones was when my mom brought it home and told me that it was written by a 15 year old girl named Flavia Bujor. I was hooked from that point on. Anything written by someone my age is worth a serious try. So I picked it up and started reading. Although the audience for this book was a bit below my reading level, the delightful story of the Three girls? adventures and the land of Fairytale kept me entranced until the finish.
Flavia Bujor is only 15 and has now written and published her first book in not only her native French, but also in many different languages, including English. She lives in Paris, France and goes to high school. Her second novel is in process. One of the things that I really like about the book is that fact that it?s author is so young. It inspires me to not give up on my dreams, because they really can come true with hard work.
This book starts out with three very different girls finding out on their mutual birthdays that they were not the children of their adopted parents. The girls then meet at midnight to find out and meet their intertwined destinies. They take out their stones and as they are holding them in their hands ?All three girls closed their eyes at exactly the same time, and bond formed between them.? Although Jade is snooty, Amber is emotional, and Opal is withdrawn and they seem to constantly be in disagreement, they are forced to work together. Within these three girls I see different traits that I can find in myself. Some traits I like, and others I don?t. The fact that I can connect so well to the main characters made the book more fun to read. The girls discover that the land they had been living in was not the wonderful thing that they had been taught. They discover Fairytale and to save Fairytale from invasion must risk their lives and fulfill a prophecy that has been around for years.
The book its self was not a shining star that I will treasure forever and make sure that all my friends read. On the other hand, it was not a horrid flop of a book either. Within it?s covers it holds a story that takes you through worlds of wonders and horrors. The fantasy aspect is very creative in finding new things instead of borrowing from others ideas. The three girls in it add the element of growing up to the whole affair. The learn how to give and take, work together, and find themselves in the process. The point that brought dulled the stories glow for me was the lack of interesting word choices. While the language got it?s point across, it failed to captivate me the way really good books do. I?m not sure if that was caused by the age of the writer or by the fact that it was written in French and then translated into English. The word choice problem that I had with the book could be solved by focusing the book to a younger age group. (...)This book was worth my time. I enjoyed the plot and the development of the characters. However, I thought that the vocabulary choices could have been a little different. If you have a child that likes adventure or fantasy, this would be a good choice. Perhaps the simple story would even appeal to an adult?s taste. Whatever the case, it is worth it to make a young girl?s dream come true.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars i have valid reasons for disliking this book, October 19, 2005

By	thereviewer - See all my reviews

I know that there is probably many 1 or 2 star reviews here with similar comments but I'd still like to state my opnion. I do not meant to seem overly critical, but I have never read a worse book. This was suggested to me by a friend because I myself am in the process of writing a fantasy novel and I thought to myself "hmm another young author...lets see what quality of work can get published". Ai yi yi...I should not have wasted my money. Actually, that can be taken back, because it is inspiring for this reason: if Flavia Bujor can become an international bestselling author, then I'm certain that I can get published. That is the only upside to this book, and now for my reasons.

1. The plotline is shallow and very unbelievable. I'm not exactly sure what audience and age grouping she was targeting...but I'm around her age and my goodness. One thing that I've learned from all the books or articles on writing that I've read is this: coincidences are the easy way out, but that does not make them the best way. That shows the inability of the author to be creative and to come up with a detailed and believble plotline. Ms. Bujor obviously has not aquired that talant just yet. She not only uses the "technique" of coincidence, she bases her entire story around it. Also, the plotline is entirely too overused and I havn't the slightest idea of how something so farfetched and unbelievable as this can be interesting.

Another reason it is not interesting is that the characters are not people that can be identified with. As many reviewers have previously said, they are stereotypes. One is a snobbish member of the nobility, another the withdrawn and intelligent antisocial girl, and the other a poorer person who is the perfect person and has no...character flaws to speak of. None of their emotions were conveyed well, and were therefore not moving and yet another reason not to be able to identify with them. In addition to this, people are falling in love with people I believe a day or two after they have met. And if I am mistaken (it was awhile ago) then it just proves that she cannot convey the sense of time. I believe several days passed yet I felt as if it were only minutes. Another thing about characters: they do not change. Ok, well maybe Jade becomes less snobby, but they don't really change. Their experience did not change them. And in the world of characters, that defeats the purpose of events.

The setting, or what of it the readers can scrape up, is again, overused. The concept of their being a world of "Fairytale" is interesting and could have been made into a readable story, but this was not that story. The world was not described as much of the rest of the setting and I havn't the slightest clue of what things looked like, smelt like, felt like, sounded like, you get the picture. I do not know the world in which i have been (reluctantly) thrown into. I cannot visualize the story.

If Ms. Bujor was going to make a story out of this (why? i have not quite figured that out yet) then there is one thing she did very wrong. This book is 386 pages: a decent size for a book alright nothing long or short but right there in the middle. However, it also has huge margins and is double spaced. Alright so its double spaced; cut that in half. It is 193 pages long with huge margins. Hmm....193. Now that's a very different number. Not to say that short stories cannot be good, because they most definitly can, but this is not a short story. The plotline has the potential of being a full length novel (even if it is a bad one). You cannot fit this much material into 193 pages with huge margins and have it be any good. There is no way that you can have all of those events, work any sort of backstory in to give your characters depth, gradually explain the settings, develope your characters, show how any of your characters have changed, give the reader enough to have suspense build within them, have enough time to spend on emotional things such as grief (she seemed to try to tap into that...it did not work it made me feel angry that human emotions are so easily written about...its just not possible to do it this way), I could go on...but I think I've already taken up enough of your time so I'll move on.

I know another reviewer touched on this, but her overused phrases such as "The Chosen One" and "Light" and "Dark" just don't work for me. They make it even more the childish book. It also makes me want to believe its a child's game of there's a big bully on the playground so we're going to turn into heroes and conquer the playground...that's about how much victory I sensed in the end. They had not accomplished anything in my mind. One reason may be that the opposition and "evil" was not enforced enough, but there you have it.

Now as for her style of writing, there is not emotion. In order to draw a reader in, you must say "AMBER REMEMBERED it being so and so and looking like so and smell and the smells and all of that" instead of "it was like this" you have to make references to your characters. It just has no feel otherwise. I suppose a very good author could get away with it, but Flavia Bujor certainly does not fall under that catagory. Just to give you some examples of bad writing or what have you -
the first paragraph "He had been awake all night, thinking. He had gone without rest or nourishment. He did not need them. He had to devise his plan - that was the only thing that mattered. At dawn, he had once again summoned the Council of Twelve telepathically. The session had been breif. He had simply informed them that the matter was in hand, that the project could not fail, and that he would soon put it into execution. The council members had not dared to ask him what his plans were. They had complete faith in him. After all, he was their superior. He had ordered them to return at noon for a meeting of the utmost importantce."
Alright there are numerous things wrong with this. Every single sentence has the same sort of opening, he was used about 5 bgillion times, this person who is supposively the villain seemed entirely unvillain like, "utmost importance" overused and not a good way to start a book, "telepathically" again not good, no drawing the character in and making the words come ALIVE. Again, I could go on, but for the sake of time I will not.
And may I say now that one of her charactes (he's minor but still) is named Theodon? Hmmm....now what does that remind me of...I really can't think of it...oh yes only the book that every fantasy fan has read and that is so widely publisized that it would not be in your interest to copy it. Oh well onto the writing.
"Amber!"
Startled from her reverie (overused), Amber gave Jade a puzzled look.
"AMber havn't you noticed that something's wrong with Opal?" (my goodness)
Amber turned toward Opal, who had stopped a little way behind them: her face was frozen in frigh (ahem), her eyes fixed and vacant.
"I tried to shake her - she didn't move," continued Jade. "And you just kept walking!"
....blah blah blah I am lazy and don't feel like typing out the whole conversation....on to important things that follow..
The two girls spoke to Opal and tried to rouse her from her trance (mmm hmm). In her distress, AMber felt overwhelmed with remorse (really I don't feel it...wasn't she just spaced out a second ago?), even though Opal's plight was hardly her fault (of course I forgot she's the noble heroine). THen all of a sudden (gasp the suspense!), Opal seemed to come to (really now). THe mask of terror (hackhack) vanished, but when she tried to say something, she abruptly fainted.
....blankly stares at the page......righto you get my drift.
Alright so by the way four lines later she is up telling them about this vision that she had.

Well I'm sure that you've heard quite enough from me. I urge to please walk by this book in the bookstore (I found it in a young adults section...hmm) and do not give it a second thought other than to think "boy I'm sure glad I'm not wasting my money on that!". I believe that the only reason this sells at all is because she is 15 or so now. Well, guess what, I'm younger than that I can write a whole lot better. I am...appalled at what goes on the bookshelves. I mean, I'm not too fond of Eragon either (I don't think the style is anything special) but the plotline is wonderful, the characters are at least developed, there is a backstory, I feel emotion, I am interested enough to finish it for the sake of reading...not inspiration to do better. So there is my opinion, and I am in no way trying to insult Ms. Bujor. Anyone should be able to write anything they want; it is her editor's or agent's or publishing company's fault. Alright...I'm done now.

36 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A real dissapointment, September 21, 2004

By	Nancy E. "Nancy" (USA) - See all my reviews

I have come across bad books before but none of them has ever left such a horrible taste in my mouth as The Prophecy of the Stones. I don't know ever know where to start. The one thing I will not criticize is Ms. Bujor's writing style. I'm not saying that it wasn't horrible, but I'm willing to be a nice person and blame every mistake on the chance that it was badly translated. But if you'd like an idea about here writing style let me put it this way. People have criticized books written by young authors such as Amelia Atwater-Rhodes and Christopher Paoloini but let me tell you, their prose is Shakespeare compared to Ms. Bujor. Bad translation is no excuse from the horrible plotline. It's you're typical sheroic fantasy story line, three girls discover they have magical gifts that can save the world. Jade, a spoiled daughter of a local duke; Amber a naieve but sweet peasant girl; and Opal a stony intellectual; are given beautiful stones on their birthday, each one the same as their name. They learn that they are part of a prophecy and their connections with these magical stones will help them save the world. How? They are not sure? But Jade's noble father, Opal's elderly grandmother, and Amber's dying mother, tells them to meet the other two girls at a large tree. They warn them that they will be their enemies and they must be careful. What they're supposed to do, well that's up to them to find out. Meanwhile in modern day in Paris, France, a depressed teenager named Joa lies dying on a hospital bed. The only thing keeping her alive is the dreams she has of three girls, Jade, Opal, and Amber.

My first complaint is the characters themselves. All three of the main characters are incredibly stereotypical. Jade is the basic spoiled rich noble who is quite pretty and whines until she gets her way. Amber is an ordinary, simple but caring peasant who is also pretty. Opal is a emotionless intellectual who, before the novel, spent most of her times with books. Also, she has a unique beauty. Notice a trend here? Unfortunately it's not just them who are horrible characters. The Nameless one is your typical tragic warrior with a sad past that for some reason he can't remember. Adrien, who looks to be one of the few decent characters in the novel, all but vanishes after they first enter fairytale. The setting is a disappointment as well. We know little to nothing about the world that Jade, Opal, and Amber grow up in. We know a little more about fairytale, after all that's where most of the story takes place, but the author describes the area very sloppily. We don't much of a picture of the area except for the City of Thaar and where the Ghibdul's live. But moving on...

Now the plot. There is nothing original in this. It's almost as if Ms. Bujor, while writing this, simply thought of other things used in other fairytales, fantasy books, and fantasy movies and just stuck them in. There are parts of the story that make no sense at all. For once, why did the three girls' parents tell them they were enemies? Never explained. What is Joa dying of? Never explained. It appears to be a broken heart or something of the like. I often found myself putting down the book and saying, "what!" in some areas. One seen that I found almost laughable is the scene where they rebel against the Armies of Darkness (I'll get on that one later) near the beginning of the book. Adrien, a rebel they met only a chapter before, is leading the charge. The three girls have no real place in the battle until hark! Jade remembers that she studied about warcraft in school. She warps into a warrior maiden who is an expert fighter. She takes out members of the Army of Darkness, soldiers who are probably seasoned fighters, easily and has no remorse over their death. When all seems lost Opal speaks out against darkness in a dramatic speech (at least I think it was a dramatic speech. Most of the dialogue in this novel is overdramatic and preachy so I'm not sure), and is stabbed as a result. Adrien, thinking her dead, screams in horror declaring that "I loved her!" even though he had just met her the chapter before and had barely said to words to her. It was at this point I seriously considered putting the book and I kinda wish I did.

A couple more problems I had (these are more nit-picky things than anything) were the very stereotypical names for places and groups. The bad guys have the "Armies of Darkness" (Evil dead anyone?), and the "Sorcerer's of Darkness" while the good guys have the "Armies of Light." The Chosen One, is a powerful man who is, according to legend, supposed to lead the good guys to victory against the dark and become king (Lord of the Rings rip off right there).

It just wasn't a good book. There are more things I COULD complain about but I'd rather not. [...]