Flight of the Griffin, C.M. Gray

Flight of the Griffin - C. M. Gray -

Flightof the Griffin by author C. M. Gray  is a wonderful adventure for young teens but I found it fine for all ages. It is the end times for the world, and the tale opens when Pardigan, the boy- thief, steals a knife and a book from a merchant’s locked cabinet and sets the events into motion. Quint, the leader of his group of friends is the strongest and is a fighter. Loras is the boy-magician whose master died before Loras could learn what he needed to know and who’s magic never works right. Tarent is a dreamer, a storyteller and he keeps the other boys’ spirits up when times are hard.  Orphans all, they live on the abandoned boat, The Griffin.

Along with the knife and other loot from the merchant’s house, Pardigan has also gained a strange, magical talking cat named Mahra.  This cat who changes back and forth from a girl, to an owl, to a cat, depending on her mood, knows how to unlock the secrets of the magical knife and book. They do as they are told to and become the Magician, Thief, Priest and Fighter, four heroes with a task to right the balance of the world which must have equal amounts of Order and Chaos.  They have been chosen to be the Soldiers for Order and to oppose Chaos in a quest that pits them against magic, demons and ‘The Hawk,’ an evil hunter of men.

I really like the way the four boys are real – they are written as boys are, unfinished and not quite men yet, but the promise of their adulthood is there in each of them.  Mahra is an old soul (literally hundreds of years old) and is written as such, but she is also young in many ways.

The travels and adventures the boys and Mahra have are well written and believable.  The scenery and the backgrounds against which the tale takes place are rich and yet not overdone.  I would recommend this book to anyone who simply loves a good adventure.

 

Cornerstone, by Misty Provencher

Nalena's story captured me from the first sentence. The image of a girl living with a mother who writes constantly, filling the house with piles and piles of paper covered with small, neat writing, was addictive. And Nalena herself is beautifully realized. Like Harry Potter in The Order of the Phoenix, she is adolescent and angry.


Her anger is understandable. She is bullied at school, and she has to lug home those reams of paper for her mom. She's pretty, and she could be popular, but because one girl saw the inside of her home, her nickname is "The Waste."

It isn't until she meets Garrett Reece that her life begins to change. He is gorgeous and kind, and his family takes Nalena and her mother in. More importantly, he seems to understand her mom and why Nalena herself is starting to experience some strange episodes of her own.


Provencher insisted on including the fantasy element in the book, to the point of rejecting agents' cries for a rewrite into a more realistic book. The fantasy is well-done, although the ending does feel a bit rushed. (As a fellow author I can sympathize; endings are incredibly difficult to pull off.) Still, it's satisfying and makes me want more.


Keystone will be the next in the series, and I shall certainly look for it.


Here's what I liked about the book:


1. The writing is fantastic. "A wave of hot, rancid stomach soup rolls through me." I remember that stomach soup feeling from my own teens. That little sentence captures that feeling of dread perfectly. 


Another example: "There's a whole library full of empty tables up front, but this boy, with hair that would probably feel like soft twine between my fingertips, has to sit here." Great description, and I'm very thankful that she resisted the urge to use the Jewel Words: topaz eyes, etc. 

2. Nalena herself. She's a well-drawn, conflicted character.


3. The tensions between Nalena and her mother. It's perfect and logical.


4. Provencher is self-published, and the format and edit are just about perfect. Too many self-published novels roll into cyberspace with myriad errors, and Cornerstone is clean of those. Again, as an author with a small (tiny) press, I appreciate this. Self-publication is an art form, and Provencher has pulled it off beautifully!


A few quibbles:


1. You know that I love female friendships. Nalena and Garrett become friends, but she doesn't have a girlfriend to chat with in the book. The one girl who hangs with her in school, Cora, is depicted as a physically repulsive, not-very-nice person. I would have preferred to see a friend who could be counted on throughout the story.


2. Garrett was just a bit too perfect. He's gorgeous and kind, as I said, but he really would have sprung to life if he had a few flaws. 


Perhaps these will be addressed in the next book. And I'm being very picky. For those quibbles, I give Provencher a 4 out of 5 stars, and I definitely recommend this as a great read.


You can buy Cornerstone here: on Amazon and on Barnes and Noble Nook
and find Misty Provencher here: http://mistypro.blogspot.com/
She is also on Twitter: @mistyprovencher