Completed: Shadow Hunters By Linda McNabb

Before i jump into the review i'm going to mention a few things right off the bat.

1) I didn't realize that this is technically book two in a series... i say technically cause it's really stand alone but she states that it's best read after her other book The Dragons apprentice.

2) Because this was on my kindle I only read it while on transit... essentially creating a 2 month gap where i didn't have time to read or i wasn't on the train or the bus...

3) i don't like to do this.... but i was essentially reading two books at once because i own the blinding knife as a real physical hard cover book and it's just too big to carry around... why don't i like reading two things at once? cause one will almost always be better.... and considering the other one was a brent weeks novel.... you know... one of my fav authors.... yeah this one didn't stand a chance.

But is the book good or bad.... hm... this is going to take some explaining.

The premise of the book is really interesting, The world is full of humans and Elves... but the elves are called shadows cause for some reason they don't cast shadows, The main character turns 13 or so and suddenly notices he doesn't have a shadow... thats odd.... and now he has humans known as hunter after him.... oh this can't end well.
af but thats not enough conflict... see theres also a baby dragon that they find.... it's dying mother gives the main characters the request of takign the dragon home.

well they are heading in that direction anyways so no biggie....
They need to go to the elves village known as Shaldow (probably spellign it wrong... sorry i'm not feeling so great right now and i'm too lazy to check.) so they can get the main character (and potentially his younger sister who may or may not be an elf as well) an elf stone which will give him a shadow so he can hide among humans.

I wont lie... i think thats a really cool idea for elves, haven't seen anything quite like it....
too bad the rest of the book just can't live up to the awesome premise....

The good: 

Again the way the world works (except for in the second half) is really cool and other then the magic being kind of useless it was still an interesting take.
There is one line at the end of a chapter that made me burst out laughing... so i'd consider that oen line really well done.

The not so good and really annoying (at least to me): 

Thanks to roleplaying most of my teen years some things sound different in my head when i read them.
"THIS IS SHOUTING"
"This is talking normally"
'this is whispering'
'this' or /this/ is speaking inside someones head.

I know this isn't true when it comes to reading but that doesn't change the fact that it's how i hear it.
The entire book has dialogue that looks like 'why hello there i'm talking now' so i read ALL the character dialogue as a whisper... not bad persay but irritating.... if only to me...

The bad: 

Wow.... this story is Linear....
first they did this.... then that.... then another thing that just so happens to not take them off their path.
Nothing is refferenced back, things happen at whiplash speed.
(i'll use an example of near the end)
Dragon gets sick >Character get kidnapped>main ones try and rescue them but first go other way>do what they need to do then go back after kidnappers> catch up> get caught > main character gets free again> oh lets go check on the dragon> yay shes better > go rescue attempt 2! > get caught again.... dammit

and that's about.... 2 or 3 chapters of plot? maybe 4? it's just all over the place and convenient as all hell.

the other bad thing.... the ending doesn't have a terribly good climax due to lack of conflict and the ending is WAY too happy... granted i hate happy endings so i'm already biased i just didn't feel they earned the ending they got....

The Unforgivable:

I can't remember the main characters names because i don't know how to pronounce them.... except for Trix... i remember the sisters name but not how to spell it...  I really HATE when authors give their characters names that just are impossible to pronounce or too confusing to remember.... especially consiering i took a 2 month break from this book... at least the names didn't have apostrophes in them.... i refuse to even read books like that.


Is the book badly written? no... i have a feeling this is probably one of their earlier works so i'm sure her new stuff is better.... and yeah her writing is fine i just greatly dislike her style.... but i can see the ideas are there.

The book was just mediocre.... I enjoyed it well enough but i can already feel parts of it fadingfrom my memory....

oh well... i'll hopefully have enough time to finish blinding knife this weekend (though i work 8 hours tomorrow and then have a event thing on sunday so who knows) and now i need to get another kindle book.... i have a few on there that i haven't finished but Monte cristo is for when i have nothing else and the others aren't holding my attention as much as i want.... maybe aaron pogue has released something recently....