The Desert Spear: Book Two of The Demon Cycle Author: Peter V. Brett | Language: English | ISBN:
B00338QEHY | Format: PDF
The Desert Spear: Book Two of The Demon Cycle Description
BONUS: Now with twenty pages of bonus material, including an exclusive interview with Peter V. Brett, and an excerpt from Peter V. Brett's
The Daylight War.The sun is setting on humanity. The night now belongs to voracious demons that prey upon a dwindling population forced to cower behind half-forgotten symbols of power. Legends tell of a Deliverer: a general who once bound all mankind into a single force that defeated the demons. But is the return of the Deliverer just another myth? Perhaps not. Out of the desert rides Ahmann Jardir, who has forged the desert tribes into a demon-killing army. He has proclaimed himself Shar’Dama Ka, the Deliverer, and he carries ancient weapons—a spear and a crown—that give credence to his claim. But the Northerners claim their own Deliverer: the Warded Man, a dark, forbidding figure. Once, the Shar’Dama Ka and the Warded Man were friends. Now they are fierce adversaries. Yet as old allegiances are tested and fresh alliances forged, all are unaware of the appearance of a new breed of demon, more intelligent—and deadly—than any that have come before.
- File Size: 1983 KB
- Print Length: 674 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0345524144
- Publisher: Del Rey (April 13, 2010)
- Sold by: Random House LLC
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00338QEHY
- Text-to-Speech: Not enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #13,129 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
To start with, like many of the other reviewers, I loved the first book. I *bought* the first book, and, as a college student who moves frequently (so money and space are both at a premium), that's saying quite a bit.
That being said, I found this book a rather disappointing sequel. While the first book focused on three characters, building them up slowly, developing them a little and then moving to another, this one spends the entire first half on a single character, Jadir, who we have no reason to like, and not a lot of reason to care about.
I will grant you, the backstory for him is kind of cool, but I can't even give it the praise of being well-written, because the transitions in time (from present day to backstory and back again), were frequently poorly handled, leaving me confused as to why something was happening because I was in the wrong time period.
Even coming in knowing that the first half was about him, I found myself wishing early on that we could just get back to the characters I liked, and their much more promising development. That, however, disappointed as well.
Arlen: Arlen was, and remains, my favorite character in this series. Most of the parts about Arlen involved him beating it into our heads that he isn't human any more, and is such an abomination that he ought to just give up and die. However, his travels alone, and interactions with the people from his past were very well written and fascinating, and his reunion with his adopted parents was poignant.
The Jongular (who's name I forget): That probably says most of what needs to be said about him. He felt like an adjunct character in the first book, and he doesn't seem to be much more here.
Let me begin by saying the first book in this series The Warded Man is easily one of my favorite books of all time. Brett did a brilliant job setting up a world (possibly in our future) where the total human population had been reduced from billions at its peak to a few hundred thousand struggling to survive. In this world, indestructible demons ruled the night and people huddled behind fences that were tested every time the sun went down and where the slighted mistake in setting them up meant that everyone inside would die a violent death. At the end of the first book, the discovery of the combat wards allowed the humans to start to fight back and removed "indestructible" from the demon description. They were still at least the equivalent of a horde of hungry grizzly bears though -- a Krasian in his prime who had trained his entire life should be able to defeat it 3 times out of 4, but they were hardly a push over.
By the end of the second book though, Brett had reduced the demons a little more than a nuisance. The point in the book where he completely lost my support was when Arlen went to the village and told the elders that if they did not take up a spear and go demon hunting he would leave them. So this 80 yr old granny who walks with a cane grabs a spear and goes out and kills a wood demon. Really? Do you think a untrained senior citizen could kill a bear with nothing but a sharp spear and a Taser?
Other reviewers have complained about all the time spent on the Jardir/Krasian back story. Personally I was fine with Brett giving more depth to the culture.
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