Spam, Spam, Rape, Spam, Rape, Rape

So, how often do you read a middle grade/YA book where reader comments can run along the lines of "could the rape be toned down"?

This book starts off as an imaginative and entertaining "Wizard of Oz" knockoff, with a spunky/magicky/conflicted heroine and an extremely odd assortment of companions. We're off through some veil to a magical Kingdom in search of the Water of Life that will cure the heroine's Dad and also cure each of the odd companions of their individual oddities. The opener is fast paced, with some witty dialogue and a lot of clever flourishes in the oddness and magic departments. The story even seems to be dripping with metaphorical and allegorical possibilities. It all gets a bit silly and random toward the end, but meanwhile there are plenty of interesting bits.

Except. Somewhere along the way our heroes end up being trailed by an immoral evil Sheriff. He is using a bespelled former teacher of the teenage heroine's in order to track her. The teacher is a psychotic pedophile whose entire internal monologue consists of ravings about his sexual desire for the heroine, and for any other young girls he comes across. He proves this to us by raping a random teenage girl and trying to rape the heroine. But apparently this is O.K., because while the teenage victim only has her jaw broken and teeth knocked out, on the page, the actual rape is only hinted at and is accomplished off-page. What? Why is this here? We knew we weren't in Kansas anymore, but we aren't in Oz anymore either. None of this is at all "necessary" to the plot.

But don't worry. Our Sheriff takes up with a weird posse of teenage pseudo-redneck quasi-cowboy sociopaths, and those fellas do plenty of raping of teenage girls. We burn down two different villages, spend our nights raping two different sets of teenage girls, and then "...watch the girls straggle back toward town, wondering what they were going back to. Had all of the boys in the town been killed? Would they starve when winter came? It wasn't the Sheriff's business." And this is all totally irrelevant to the main storyline, which is developing in a different direction as a dopey teen romance.

I've read a number of reviews that hmmm and hah over whether this book is middle grade or YA? Really? Are you kidding me? Someone wondered if the rape could be "toned down"? That's your question? How about - why do we have rape and a raving pedophile in a book that is otherwise a light teen juvenile romance Wizard of Oz knockoff? And why would one possibly want to read it?

(Please note that I received a free ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

It seemed to be a bit bland for me. It wasn't adult fiction nor was it teen fiction it was kind of a weird mid-point. Half the book in each category. Because of this, it emitted the same feeling of the storm in the beginning of the book extremely choppy.

I will confess I'm a bit of a loss to review this book. It was awkward in places and stranger than strange in others; but not necessarily bad. I'm going to try and break it down to see if that helps with my 'meh' 3 star rating.

Characters
We have a wide cast of characters but certainly one of the most important is our 'Pinocchio' wooden boy, Errol. He is a really odd character as most of the time it's easy to forget that he is wooden. That said his evolution from boy to (more or less) dead to wooden to his final end state is actually one of the better parts of the story. No none of those things are spoilers. I would have liked a bit more focus or time spent on his choices as a living boy but at the same time there is a lot of plot and characters so maybe it doesn't really matter.
The lead gal, Aster, is a whole other confusing mess. What's most important about her is she is the catalyst for the whole book. While Errol is the main character; without Aster there is no story to tell.
My personal favourite character however is the 'nov', a virgin ghost. Yes that's right 'virgin' is very important for some reason. And it amused me greatly that there was even a word for a virgin ghost that Greg Keyes didn't make-up!
Other characters come and go in the story as our fierce some three travel together. One is amazing, but I can't tell you anything about them as it would ruin the surprise.

Plot
The Reign of the Departed is a quest story. With three clear goals that Aster needs to accomplish in order to succeed with her quest. It starts to feel a little like The NeverEnding Story in places as each piece of area of the quest has it's own little interaction and story line. This would be a great book to turn into a role-playing game (RPG) like Zelda as it's broken-up in such a distinct and obvious way. Clearly this allows children to follow the story easier and feel like there are 'parts' to it.

Strange, strange settings
I'll confess I'm a goth girl. Was a full-goth in the 90's as a teen and still definitely lean towards darker elements. I like my fantasy dark and broody. Add in some violence, a tough of romance and a lot of character building and you've likely got me hooked. So when authors go off on odd tangents where the world has just become ridiculous I have a hard time. Points in Keyes series starter felt like Otherland by Tad Williams. I did not like Otherland (although I did read it 20 years ago... I suppose it may be time to give it another try) as it had moments that just seemed outrageous. Those types of moments Keyes presents here are equally ridiculous but given this is a middle age/teen book I accepted the ridiculousness and carried on. It also wasn't the entire setting that was in these weird places and so I was able to quickly 'read my way out' into other better settings.

Age Appropriateness
My library has this book filed as Young Adult/Teen and I think that is the right place for it. However, there are a lot of juvenile things that happen in this book, and the set-up feels like it's more for the middle aged group range. That is until you get to some parts. There are deaths of characters, a implied (but not described) rape or two and some intense (but non-sexual) romance scenes. And so because of these elements I suppose it's a teen novel. I feel like the deaths could remain and the rape toned down to a kiss that wasn't invited and you could easily adapt this novel for the middle grade audience where it would likely be better suited. Or it's a good transition novel for a kid just moving into the teen world. The aspects and writing will be familiar but the teen themes will maybe help transition them into more intense teen books. No matter how you look at this the weird age mixture of elements threw me off a lot. I just felt confused at times about who the target market was.

Overall
This is just an okay book. I liked most of the characters well enough and there are some thoughts and progressions of characters that are very well done. However some of the settings and situations were just silly to me and I found myself wondering when it would end. I would definitely consider reading the next book if it was put in front of me but am not sure I would search it out. Shortly after I finished reading this book I felt like I had already forgotten most of it as it didn't really make an impression or mark on me. So not a bad book but not a great book either. I'm really stuck in the 'meh' space on this one.

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.

As always Greg Keyes has a wonderful imagination, something which is lacking in the SF/F field. Alas his story doesn't seem to a reader like me to go somewhere of interest. There is no apparent goal thus a gradual lack of interest in another fantasy realm to learn and forget once the last page is turned.

This was definitely an interesting book. I liked the main characters and thought that it had a unique blend of different kinds of magic that helped it to stand out from some of the other more standard portal fantasy books I've read. There was a definite blend of magic and technology and I like the idea of all the different magical kingdoms that are separate but still kind of connected as well. I thought that the characters played well off of each other for the most part, although the inclusion of the dreaded YA love triangle in the later part of the book was a definite letdown. Still, it didn't take up a lot of the page time so I hope it's not going to be something that will be focused on too heavily in the next book.

This book was probably more of a 3.5 for me but I rounded it down for one pretty big reason - there is a LOT of implied / attempted rape in this book. It never happens 'on screen' and it's definitely never presented as something that is acceptable, but it still took me right out of the story and made me pretty uncomfortable on a lot of occasions. There's several instances of teen boys raping other teen girls and also one of an adult man raping a teen girl [and attempted rape of another] so if that is something you would rather avoid then I would say you might want to skip this one. Like I said before, it is by no means explicit and it's definitely not condoned by the narrative, but it's still there and I know a lot of people would rather not have to deal with it all.

This was hard to get into! Has potential, but lacking something! So much going on! Thank you netgalley for the free arc in exchange for an honest review!

I hope that this book is the beginning of a series because it ends keeping you guessing what's next.
I love the complex world building, the fantastic cast of characters and the enthralling plot.
The characters were well developed, real human being and not simple archetypes.
There's some awkwardness but it can be expected in the first book in a series.
I cannot wait to read the next instalment as I really liked this one.
Highly recommended!
Many thanks to Skyhorse and Netgalley for this ARC

I didn't like it that much and failed to understand the entirety of it huhuhuhu I guess this wasn't just made for me.

Aster's Father is the only one who knows her true self...until his memory fades. Now he doesn't even recognise her. With a group more powerful than she can imagine and magic on the tip of her tongue Aster knows she can make things "normal" again...maybe. The Reign Of The Departed is full of adventure, magic, worlds unfound and darkness (like evil darkness...original Grimm fairytale style...don’t let young kids read it). I fully expect this to be the beginning of a series, because it hooks you in and leaves you hanging.

I couldn't get into it. It was dull

Sorry but I couldn't get into the book at all. I tried though, I'm so sorry for my ADD brain.

If I wanted to get highfalutin' about it I'd say that each character in this book represents a masculine or feminine archetype. Errol is the Nice Guy (interestingly, effectively emasculated through much of the book, since he's in an artificial body that lacks genitalia); Aster, who put him in that situation, is the Witch, and also the Weird Nerd Girl; Dusk is the Warrior Princess; Veronica is the Man-Eating Seductress Monster, though she's mostly trying not to be; the dog-boys represent one kind of toxic masculinity, the creepy teacher another; there's a Controlling Father and a Monster Mother, and all in all it's the collective unconscious up in here.

With all that going on, it could easily have failed to be a successful adventure story, but it didn't. It's a fetch quest, but a well-motivated one with plenty of twists and strong sensawunda, even if some of the setting is a bit sketchy in terms of practicalities. Nor are the characters simply archetypes; they're people with complicated relationships among themselves, which shift and change throughout.

For me it was solid, but didn't quite achieve greatness, despite more than the usual amount of depth to the relationships. The characters are fleshed out, but could be more so, and there were moments when I felt the narrative drive faltered.

Lots of potential, though, and it ends in a way that, while completing this story, leads clearly into a sequel.