*Note: I received Beyonders book 1: A World Without Heroes by
Brandon Mull from Simon & Schuster Canada for review. I was not
paid but received the ARC for free
This is a fantastic book of adventure that will appeal to both boys
and girls. Jason's quest is interesting and full of cool creatures
and characters. From the very first quote, full of irony, I knew I
would enjoy Mull's sense of humour. There was a chapter near the
end of the book where I was laughing out loud in fits of giggles
because it was so ridiculous and awesome.
I have mixed feelings about an enemy who has the power to kill
instantly but prefers to toy with his victims. This is overly
convenient, like the bad guy who tells the hero the whole plan
allowing him the chance to succeed. On the other hand I like
devious villains who go for more than the obvious kill….
I'm concerned that this book is not being marketed to the right age
group. The ARC indicates it's for ages 8-12 but I strongly disagree
with this for several reasons
•The vocabulary: I enjoyed the language, that sounded a lot more
academic and sophisticated than many YA novels but I don't know
many 8 year-olds who know "engendered", "endeavor", "embittered",
"laced" as in poisoned, "meandered", "auditory hallucination" and
many more challenging words. I found the diction to be more
appropriate to older teens or adults, certainly not 10 and under.
With the exception of "super-cool" that was thrown in a few times
and felt awkward and out-of-place, I thought the writing was smooth
and elegant. Unfortunately throwing in the "super-cool" just seemed
like trying too hard and didn't accomplish making the book
accessible to that audience.
•The violence: The book begins with a man being tortured. I think
middle age novels can have some violence and a dose of reality but
I think a lot of parents will object to their children reading
about people being tortured to the point of breaking, even if the
torture is not described in detail. I was having mord-sith
flashbacks from Terry Goodkind's novels and those are NOT FOR KIDS!
•Mature themes: addiction, gluttony and complacency were
beautifully demonstrated. I loved the line, "most pleasures are
best as a seasoning, not the main course". The trouble is that I
think a slightly older age group would better understand the
addiction and apathy aspects of the novel.
An aspect of the book that appealed to my nerdy side was the power
of words. The tyrant ruled by preventing learning and forbidding
the organization of information (like drawing maps). I think his
limitations on learning were more effective than his violence, and
I am fascinated by this as one who promotes learning and sorting of
info.
I did not have anything in common with the loremaster. I don't
understand how a librarian can believe that a text handed down from
unknown origins is more credible than one with a known author. He
said they were harder to dismiss but I disagree, if I don't know
who the author is I question the validity of anything in the
material (when it comes to non-fiction). I like to know the
education, work history ect. of a historian before I believe what
he/she writes, and I would certainly not trust anonymous more than
a specific source. I also disliked that he made the library
inaccessible on purpose to make sure only serious scholars would
come.
I would recommend this to teens, especially boys who like baseball,
biology, or adventure stories. I would caution about the age
discrepancies though, and put it in the YA section of my library
rather than JR
originally reviewed at http://libraryya.wordpress.com