The Garden of Stones by Mark T. Barnes
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Barnes presents in The Garden of Stones a well developed, fully laid out world. The reader is catapulted into the conflict head first, and although those first few chapters are confusing, chaotic scenes of fighting between factions in a war we don’t understand, it all makes sense soon enough.
At first, the cast of characters seems daunting. Names, species, factions, how will you keep it all straight? While Barnes’ world is fully realized, it is a departure from the familiar. New nomenclatures are nothing new to fantasy readers, which is fortunate. But beneath the strange and new, the book really only focuses on three characters and those that orbit them. Indris, the warrior scholar and principal character. Corajidin, his rival in this book and all around mostly bad guy. Mari, daughter of Corajidin, torn between loyalty to her father and burgeoning feelings for Indris and the honor of her career.
All the while, Barnes paints a promise. There will be action, there will be intrigue, there will be cliff hangers that compel us to read further. I believe Barnes delivers on that promise in this book – the Garden of Stones was well worth the read.
Thanks to Amazon and Netgalley for the review copy of this book. It was provided in exchange for an honest review.