Velwythe: Resurrection Of The Mind by Bonn Turkington

Velwythe:  Resurrection of the Mind is Volume One and is a fantasy novel.

The story sets off with a conversation between a man and someone who believes themselves to be a great "artist".  The man is pleading with the "artist" not to destroy his city and its inhabitants but the artist thinks this will be a living piece of art that has never been seen before and before the man can warn the people of their upcoming disaster, the man is banished to the dungeon so that he cannot share the information with the people.

Vaan is a young scholarly man with a haunted past.  His mother disappeared, his father died in agony and Vaan has been haunted by terrible nightmares every year during the Festival, which also corresponds with his birthing day. 

Vaan has a terrible nightmare in which he hurts his hand, at the behest of his good friend, Jonas, he is convinced to visit the Priest in order to get his hand mended.  However, Vaan does not trust the clergy, for they refused to bring his father back from the dead.

Vaan is lonely and depressed and he decides to sell everything he owns and become a wandering scholar.  Along his journey he meets many interesting people and learns the truth about his past and yet there is this throbbing in his head, a darkness that hovers there that Vann is unable to explain.  What does the future hold for him and will he be able to keep his demons at bay long enough to figure his life out?

I thought this book was very slow to start, I enjoyed the prologue and was eager to peruse the pages.  I almost gave up reading this novel however, as the tedium of the first half of the book was almost enough to make me walk away.  I am glad I continued for the pace and the characters pick up and the reader isn't left with a hodgepodge of thoughts from Vaan and other diverse characters come to help blend with the overall nature of the book.

I thought the meandering thoughts of Vaan to be dull and pointless and was pleased when we moved beyond his thoughts, I just feel that we could've learned about Vaan and his plight by tightening the prose and removing a lot of detail that just isn't required, I found the extra descriptives bogged the story down.

I would give this book a three out of five stars, which is a step up from where I was originally planning and its only because the books does pick up about half way through!  I loved the cover art and thought it brought justice to the story contained within.  I loved the deep and philosophical undercurrent that hovered in the background of the story and the overall mysterious feeling that the book contains.

The prologue is great and you feel the need to continue reading in order to find out what the mad, crazy artist is musing about.  I equally enjoyed the world building that author, Bonn Turkington has created.  Creating new worlds, races and creatures isn't an easy feat and Bonn does exceptionally well with this aspect.

If you enjoy fantasy novels with world building themes, then you will enjoy this Velwythe:  Resurrection of the Mind, however, don't give up reading, because the book does pick up and delivers a nicely blended world according to Vaan.

SYNOPSIS:
His mother vanished. His father killed himself. Vaan, now 21 has no friends, no money, no family, and no hope. All his dreams has vanished. Unable to escape the horror of his own memories, his life has been in stasis.

But with a bit of luck and a bit of effort Vaan manages to make his first real friend since childhood. Duncan, a man who has watched the growing railline destroy his entire home city, was disowned after denying his birthright.

Vaan and Duncan become fast friends with troubled pasts. Now, with Duncan's help and the 'encouragement' of a local priest, Vaan decides his life has remained in a quagmire too long. Only by selling his house and everything he owns will he have a chance to become a wandering scholar.

Every year around the FreePort Solstice Festival (and his birthday) Vaan has terrible nightmares of his fahter's chronic pain. But the night before the festival Vaan has a dream unlike any before. He wakes up thinking he has gone blind - but it isn't just that, he can feel something, something cold pawing at his head as though it is absorbing his very thoughts.

 

** Disclosure: I did not accept any compensation from the sponsors other than review copies, my views are my own, reviewed by me..as I see it~!! **