Location : Cleveland, OH
Danny North lives on a compound in western
Virginia, close to other villages and towns, but rather self sufficient.
Rarely do they venture out, except to WalMart for the occasional item.
The inhabitants of the compound are rather unusual; Danny lives with fairies,
talking animals, walking trees, and a host of other strange creatures.
Except these creatures are gods, the gods of the Norsemen. Other Families
live on compounds in other parts of the world, also gods. Danny is not
impressed by stories of werewolves, vampires, forest sprites, and other
odd tales; the gods are capable of inhabiting animals, create sprites,
create ghosts, and the result is that the humans, "drekkas,"
report that they have witnesses something "supernatural." Danny's
parents are the leaders of this Family, as such there was much hope that
Danny would become a great god, too. However, he has shown no signs of
any god-like ability. He can't even create a simple clant, an "outself"
representation of your body, made with leaves, twigs, grass.
But Danny can run. He has discovered some secret paths that lead from the compound to the surrounding countryside, past the trees that stand sentry. He runs far and wide, free from the confines of the Family. Interestingly, he runs a lot, but is never gone long from the compound.
One day, while watching some girls work on their clants, he realizes that they have forgotten an important lesson; be aware of your surroundings. Danny, to teach them a lesson, scoops up two of the clants, races up a tree, and leaves the clants in the branches. The girls are powerless, losing one's outself is very bad. Danny is reprimanded, told to retrieve the clants. As he climbs the tree, he realizes that the clants are out of his reach. How did he manage to get them so high up in the tree? Then it dawn on him, he is a gatemage, a god that can twist time and space so that one can travel from one point to another in a blink of an eye. Gatemages are very powerful, but rarely live very long, they are to be killed as soon as they are recognized. A previous, extremely poweful gatemage, Loki, closed all of the gates between this world and the others, so that the Families search out gatemages and kill them, so that no one Family becomes more powerful than any of the others.
With that realization, Danny knows he must leave the compound and his Family, if he want to live. So begins another education for Danny, one that takes him from western Virginia to Washington, DC, Florida, and Ohio.
The other story arc in The Lost Gate centers around a character named Wad and the kingdom of Iceway. Wad is also a gatemage, a very old gatemage but one that looks young, This storyline has a different feel, as it concerns kings, queens, castle intrigues, assassinations, betrayals, and more. This arc seems a bit darker than the one with Danny, but it is key to the overall plot of the novel.
Orson Scott Card has delivered, arguably, one of the best new characters in fantasy (I am not sure what genre this novel will be associated, but fantasy seems to be okay) in Danny North and a premise that will hook the reader and not release its grip until the final page has been turned. The Lost Gate is the first in a series that Orson Scott Card will be delivering and it is wonderful. While there have been quite a few books lately that place the gods of old in present day, those are usually done for the comedic value (and quite well, I might add). In The Lost Gate, however, you have a young man, all of sixteen, trying to come to grips with his power and how to use and control it. In addition, he must survive to, hopefully, take his place amongst the greatest gods on this planet.
Not happy to live amongst the gods, Danny wants to be accepted within drekka society, our society. To assimilate himself, he enrolls in high school, to have a normal life. His preparation included a lot of reading to learn how teenagers act, talk, relate to one another. Card writes these passages with humor and incredible insight. It only heightens the enjoyment of the novel. Danny finds that is much harder to control your power in order to be accepted into high school society. The chapters dealing with Wad have a different feel, more darker, but it seems to bring balance to the novel. Orson Scott Card brings the two arcs together in a rousing, suspenseful climax that sets the stage for the next installment in the series. An installment that I will be hard pressed to show any patience while waiting for its release.
If the only Orson Scott Card novel you have read is Ender's Game, The Lost Gate will bring you back to his writing and, hopefully, finding you sharing it with the teenager in your family. It is, without question, on my Best Books of 2011 list.
Disclosure:
Obtained from: Friend
Payment: Loaned
Technorati tag: book review Orson Scott Card The Lost Gate
But Danny can run. He has discovered some secret paths that lead from the compound to the surrounding countryside, past the trees that stand sentry. He runs far and wide, free from the confines of the Family. Interestingly, he runs a lot, but is never gone long from the compound.
One day, while watching some girls work on their clants, he realizes that they have forgotten an important lesson; be aware of your surroundings. Danny, to teach them a lesson, scoops up two of the clants, races up a tree, and leaves the clants in the branches. The girls are powerless, losing one's outself is very bad. Danny is reprimanded, told to retrieve the clants. As he climbs the tree, he realizes that the clants are out of his reach. How did he manage to get them so high up in the tree? Then it dawn on him, he is a gatemage, a god that can twist time and space so that one can travel from one point to another in a blink of an eye. Gatemages are very powerful, but rarely live very long, they are to be killed as soon as they are recognized. A previous, extremely poweful gatemage, Loki, closed all of the gates between this world and the others, so that the Families search out gatemages and kill them, so that no one Family becomes more powerful than any of the others.
With that realization, Danny knows he must leave the compound and his Family, if he want to live. So begins another education for Danny, one that takes him from western Virginia to Washington, DC, Florida, and Ohio.
The other story arc in The Lost Gate centers around a character named Wad and the kingdom of Iceway. Wad is also a gatemage, a very old gatemage but one that looks young, This storyline has a different feel, as it concerns kings, queens, castle intrigues, assassinations, betrayals, and more. This arc seems a bit darker than the one with Danny, but it is key to the overall plot of the novel.
Orson Scott Card has delivered, arguably, one of the best new characters in fantasy (I am not sure what genre this novel will be associated, but fantasy seems to be okay) in Danny North and a premise that will hook the reader and not release its grip until the final page has been turned. The Lost Gate is the first in a series that Orson Scott Card will be delivering and it is wonderful. While there have been quite a few books lately that place the gods of old in present day, those are usually done for the comedic value (and quite well, I might add). In The Lost Gate, however, you have a young man, all of sixteen, trying to come to grips with his power and how to use and control it. In addition, he must survive to, hopefully, take his place amongst the greatest gods on this planet.
Not happy to live amongst the gods, Danny wants to be accepted within drekka society, our society. To assimilate himself, he enrolls in high school, to have a normal life. His preparation included a lot of reading to learn how teenagers act, talk, relate to one another. Card writes these passages with humor and incredible insight. It only heightens the enjoyment of the novel. Danny finds that is much harder to control your power in order to be accepted into high school society. The chapters dealing with Wad have a different feel, more darker, but it seems to bring balance to the novel. Orson Scott Card brings the two arcs together in a rousing, suspenseful climax that sets the stage for the next installment in the series. An installment that I will be hard pressed to show any patience while waiting for its release.
If the only Orson Scott Card novel you have read is Ender's Game, The Lost Gate will bring you back to his writing and, hopefully, finding you sharing it with the teenager in your family. It is, without question, on my Best Books of 2011 list.
Disclosure:
Obtained from: Friend
Payment: Loaned
Technorati tag: book review Orson Scott Card The Lost Gate
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