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Well Of Tears, The: A Novel (2012)

by Roberta Trahan(Favorite Author)

3.23 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

1469211467 (ISBN13: 9781469211466)

languge

English

genre

Historical Fiction

publisher

Brilliance Audio

series

The Dream Stewards

review 1: Since I am a big fan of fantasy, the first books which I read was a fantasy one, and when another of my great passions are Arthur's legends, I could only want to read this book. And yet… although I was happy concerning the fantasy, I am disappointed by the virtual non-existence of the link with Camelot. But well, while passing all this, we find ourself with an incredible reading, which makes us dream and we are perfectly able to imagine all that is described! As regards the characters, I was not disappointed! We finds everything, from the naive young girl to the bitchy girl, with the big shot, the warrior without fear and the malicious one with the heart blacker than hell. There are really enormously various personalities, the whole coordinating itself well and making th... moree things interesting. But there are perhaps a little too many things to retain, we can be lost sometimes. Beware, all the characters whose we have the point of view are really essential with the advance of the intrigue and in order to really understand everything well! The alternation from point of view is well controled and gives rhythm to the story which cruelly misses action during the first part of the book. Alwen is a charismatic character, sure of herself, ready to make sacrifices and which fights for justice. Her instinct is rarely wrong, which makes her couple with Bledig more touching. Its warrior king who is not afraid of nothing, except losing those which he likes. When to their children, Rhys and Eirlys, they are all the opposite one of the other, what makes things really interesting. Madoc, the Grand Chief of the Stewards, did not mark me more than that, contrary to Macreth, the traitor and enemy of all. As regards of Cerrigwen, she carries her role of the ambitious woman without heart to perfection, although I pity her sometimes. Glain is the character who intrigues me more and from which I will like to learn some thereafter. When in Hywel, he is almost absent from story, which is strongly too bad. The universe is hooker, it does not have nothing wrong there with the writing . Descriptions involve us in the fantastic places of the characters. We feels a whole panel of feelings, but also the difficulties which some encounter. There is perhaps a little too much descriptions and talking sometimes, which can tire the reader. We cannot prevent ourself from making comparision with Game of Thrones on several points, like with several Robin Hobb's books. A catchy story full with potential which the fans of the kind can easily like.
review 2: I heard about The Well of Tears in a NetGalley email promoting the sequel, The Keys to the Realms. While I'm still waiting for approval to read that book, The Well of Tears was available to read immediately.I'll admit that the start was a bit slow. I was tempted to walk away, but I didn't want to leave a NetGalley book unread, so I persevered. I am so glad I did. After a couple of chapters I fell in love with Alwen, one of the Mistresses of the Realms. She's strong and powerful, yet humble and kind, which just makes her awesome. The story was still a bit slow until Alwen arrived at the Fane Gramarye (magical headquarters), but it picked up once she walked in the doors, and is still (I hope) galloping forward at a breakneck pace in The Keys to the Realms.As in any good book, but especially an epic series (think Outlander, Game of Thrones, and Sword of Truth), it's extremely important to draw the reader in emotionally, and preferably to more than one main character. I care about pretty much everyone except Machreth and Cerrigwen (but they're the bad guys, so who cares, right?). I almost cried in a couple places when bad things happened to the good guys. I hate how bad things happen to good characters, but it they didn't there wouldn't be a story (doesn't make it easier, though).The action is well-written and easy to picture. I'm not terribly visual when I read a book, so when a writer can get at least a fuzzy picture in my head, she's doing a good job (yay, Roberta!). In my mind Madoc looks like Dumbledore, and Alwen reminds me of Catelyn Stark, but whatever works, right?There are a lot of characters and complex relationships, which were actually pretty easy to follow. When I got to the end, I saw there was a helpful summary of the characters, relationships, and hierarchy within the Stewardry, but my understanding of the story didn't suffer from my not having been aware of it. A map, however, would have been helpful (of the Fane Gramayre and the routes Alwen and Bledig took on there way there). Some pronunciation help in the appendix would also have been nice (as it was I just went with a phonetic interpretation, strange as it sounded).Well done, Roberta. Well done. Now hurry up and get the publisher to approve my request for The Keys to the Realms. Please.Take It less

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