The Write Reads On Tour – The Broken Heart of Arelium by Alex Robins

Click on the Cover to buy the book!

Before I begin with this review I would just like to point out that it is part of a Blog Tour with the Write Reads, this means that there are multiple blogs involved and there will be lots of different opinions and I’m sure different reasons people felt a certain way about it. So definitely look out for other reviews beyond mine to get a full picture of what to expect.

Sadly, this book wasn’t for me. I tried, really hard actually, to keep at it but unfortunately it was just too easy for me to get distracted and put it down. Which is a shame because I had been looking forward to this one.

I think my issue may have been about imagery. Now, I don’t like over descriptions but I also didn’t feel like I connected to any imagery as such in this book. I could see a couple of scenes in my head but not like other books I’ve read where it’s been as though the words on the page were just playing out in my head.

My other problem is that I felt somewhat like I had started in the middle of a story, to the point that I double checked I was definitely reading book one. Unfortunately a lot of the characters just weren’t grabbing me.

This doesn’t mean there wasn’t any imagery in the book, don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with the writing here at all. But perhaps I just don’t work well with this particular writing style. There are also many other factors to a book not grabbing someone, and no doubt I will try it again some time and it’ll probably have a completely different effect on me.

But for now, this wasn’t for me, and that’s OK because it will have been for plenty of people.

Now, I did actually finish the book, and it ended how I had expected it to, but in order to achieve that I did skip a good portion of the book from the midway point. And I know, that’s cheating, but I was curious to see how it ended and I didn’t want to force myself to sit through a book I wasn’t enjoying, because the issue with that is that I’d have given it a worse review out of that bias of forcing it.

Definitely check out the other blogs, and definitely check out the book for yourself, it’s got a gorgeous cover on it and you might find that this one is right up your street. I’ll be retweeting the other posts throughout the tour for you to check out so keep your eyes peeled if you follow me on twitter.

And if you don’t, come find me @rebbiereviews and find Dave @The_WriteReads to see more on future blog tours!