[SPOILERS] Tower Lord: Book 2 of Raven's Shadow

[Spockydog]

Seeing as there's a bit of discussion of Tower Lord on the Blood Song thread, I thought it appropriate to start a thread dedicated to the new book.

I'm only on chapter four at the moment, so I'll probably steer clear of this thread until I've finished it.

I will say that with regards to the expanded POV, my own personal jury is still out. This has nothing to do with the characters themselves - I'm intrigued by Reva, and I liked Lyrna enough in Blood Song. However, for me, what made Blood Song so special was the focus on Vaelin's story. And from what I've heard, Vaelin's chapters might not be as interesting in this book. We shall see...

Anyway, picking up from Calibandar's post in the Blood Song thread:

...what did those who like Tower Lord appreciated especially? What stood out as great?

Have at it.

[AncalagonTheBlack]

Just finished Tower Lord. I liked it, almost on par with book1. Also I think the multiple PoVs actually aided the storytelling and enhanced the scope of the book.

Ser Wun Wun


Agree, that Weaver in the end saved Lyrna and healing her. One of the pair of would be assassins were Reva's priest since his companion was calling him holy man. Was the stocky guy "Lord Brahdon " ?

I was a bit confused about this but yeah it was Weaver.Also,are we sure he actually healed her ? I mean that scene ended so abruptly.

Yes,i think the stocky guy was Lord Brahdon.His description matches with what was mentioned in a previous chapter:

“That’s him?” Vaelin asked as Alornis handed him the sketch. It showed a broad-faced man, balding, bearded, eyes narrow. He wondered if Alornis had indulged in Master Benril’s liking for artistic licence in adding a cruel twist to the mouth.

“Vaelin placed the sketch next to the one Alornis had already completed, showing a younger man of handsome aspect, though his sister had opined his nose and chin were a little too sharp. “And this is the priest?”

Two figures rose from the grass a little over twenty paces away, one tall the other stocky. The tall man carried a longbow, arrow notched and half-drawn, the stocky man an axe. They advanced slowly, the stocky man issuing a laugh. “You should trust my word more, my holy friend. I told you the Father would guide us to her.” She could see him now, broad-bearded features and a bald head, teeth bared as he raised his voice, the tone rich with mirth.

Lyrna glimpsed a narrow handsome face, drawn in hate.

So,the 'handsome' one is the priest and 'broad-faced,bearded,bald' guy is Lord Brahdon.

[trickster]

I was a bit confused about this but yeah it was Weaver.Also,are we sure he actually healed her ? I mean that scene ended so abruptly.

Yes,i think the stocky guy was Lord Brahdon.His description matches with what was mentioned in a previous chapter:

So,the 'handsome' one is the priest and 'broad-faced,bearded,bald' guy is Lord Brahdon.

Thanks for confirming the identity of the two guys.

And yes, I am pretty sure that the Weaver healed Lyrna. I had some doubts as "the scene ends so abruptly". But Ser Wun Wun's arguments have made this a slam dunk in my mind.

ETA:

For some positivity, what did those who like Tower Lord appreciated especially? What stood out as great?

As mentioned in the previous thread, the multiple PoVs have really expanded the scope of this book. We get to see the big picture of the overall conflict. The fight scenes, the battle and the siege of Cumbrael were great. All the kickassery we saw in Blood Song is still present. Yes it is mainly dished out by Frentis and Reva, but that's OK. By the end of the first book Vaelin is the undisputed badass of the world and there are several acknowledgements of this fact from various characters in the book. I would have liked to see a bit more action from him. But he does cut through the entire Volarian army, albeit with the aid of the Song and other people to get to Reva.

[Circle_breaker]

I liked that we got to see more of the Shield. I hope he gets a POV in the next book.

I enjoyed the book but surprisingly enough I didn't enjoy Vaelin's story. I needed more action from him, though i did like how much everyone from the Realm hypes him up, he really is a god like figure to them.

Frentis's was awesome, can't wait for him and Lyrna to meet up face to face.

I was really confused on the identities of Frentis's lady and Fornella, There both described the exact same way as were the master and the general. Anyone else think they were the same person throughout the entire story?

[trickster]

I liked that we got to see more of the Shield. I hope he gets a POV in the next book.

I enjoyed the book but surprisingly enough I didn't enjoy Vaelin's story. I needed more action from him, though i did like how much everyone from the Realm hypes him up, he really is a god like figure to them.

Frentis's was awesome, can't wait for him and Lyrna to meet up face to face.

I was really confused on the identities of Frentis's lady and Fornella, There both described the exact same way as were the master and the general. Anyone else think they were the same person throughout the entire story?

I did think they were the same person for almost the whole book :blushing:

It seems that the people in power at the Volarian empire gets the gift of long life from the "ally" aka the main baddie. But they are not necessarily taken over by the spirit or whatever the Witch's Bastard and the rest of them are.

[peterbound]

Why am I having such a hard time getting into this book?

Also, why the hell do authors have a beef against doing a 'what has gone on before' section before the book starts? It would be doing me a big favor.

[Spockydog]

Why am I having such a hard time getting into this book?

Also, why the hell do authors have a beef against doing a 'what has gone on before' section before the book starts? It would be doing me a big favor.

I'm struggling with it too, and considering how much I enjoyed the first book, it's a little frustrating. Is it because of the change of format, or is the story simply not as interesting? Even when Vaelin's chapters come around, I'm still left with a deep feeling of meh.

And yeah, I think, given how much shit went down in the first book, this would definitely have benefited from a short recap.

[Mexal]

I don't know when it was, but I think around 30%, I started racing through like I did in Blood Song. The story isn't as compelling, mainly because the story of a guy becoming a badass greatly appeals to me, but it definitely picks up. There is certainly a lot of setting the stage for the action to come since the way the first book ended, it didn't really do that.

[Circle_breaker]

Yea the book really picks up about half way through. The beginning is very slow.

[Darth Richard II]

The pace also gets ridiculus at like the 40 percent mark or so. Tons of plot lines that would have taken certain 90s fantasy authors 6 or 7 books to resolve are resolved, and in interesting(to me) and unxpected ways. For instance

I totally thought frentis was going to be treking around with that crazy woman for the whole book, if not

books, and when the queen was kidnapped by slavers, I was like, oh good another slavery captive story line, this will go on for three books at lea-oh. Nevermind. Maybe its because i grew up in the 90s but the pace here is very refreshing. Felt like there was very little bloat.

Also it looks like my spellcheck may be borked again, so I apologize in advance.

[True North]

It's a shame to see average reviews for the 2nd book so far from multiple sources. The first book turned out to be quite excellent.

[Circle_breaker]

I think a lot of that has to do with how self contained the first book was. It had one of the best ending of book that I can remember. The second books ending was just seemed to be a set up for the third book.

[AverageGuy]

Just finished it. I did like it, but not as much as the first. It was hard to get into, though I'll second those who say it picked up in the second half. Besides that, I'm not sure how I feel about the new POVs. In particular, I wasn't a big fan of the Frentis chapters. I get how they're affecting the plot, but they seemed kind of repetitive to me. Also, Reva's progression was very fast, and I don't just mean her swordfighting. She seems to lose a lot of her rough edges by the time she's dealing with Arentes (though she gets them back quickly enough when speaking with Lyrna), and she does an about-face on pretty much all of her former beliefs. I guess that's better than dragging things out too much, though.

I'm not too bothered by the ending. Even the first book was setting up future conflict with the Ally, and this book's main plots thread were pretty neatly tied up.

[homedawg]

I absolutely loved it. It was a lot different from the first book, but just as enjoyable. I liked the expanded scope of the story. Wished there was more Caenis, but I have a feeling we will get to that.

[YellowDogJen]

I can't comment yet, or read this spoilery thread, 'cause I just started...but so far, I'm loving it!

[YellowDogJen]

Finished. I really enjoyed it!

I should've re-read Blood Song first; I thought I remembered enough to skip it, but I was confused sometimes. That said, I liked the multiple POVs and the sheer scale of it all, from mountains to sea! Really well done.

I thought the priest was the short, balding guy and the taller one the lord...but I could be very wrong there! :cool4:

[johndance]

Ok sorry I skipped to the bottom to try to avoid spoilers so sorry if this is being addressed. Loved the first one, didn't get a chance to read tower lord yet, but it's next on my list. Just checked the reviews over at amazon and I was a bit shocked. The 'most helpful' review where 75 people thought this particular review was helpful, is a 1 star review.... all the comments of this review are saying stuff like 'couldn't agree more', 'spot on review', etc. I mean what gives here? I know some of the pov's are different but really? 1 star? I mean I can't see myself not reading this book, since I enjoyed the first one so much but whats the deal here?

[End of Disc One]

Ok sorry I skipped to the bottom to try to avoid spoilers so sorry if this is being addressed. Loved the first one, didn't get a chance to read tower lord yet, but it's next on my list. Just checked the reviews over at amazon and I was a bit shocked. The 'most helpful' review where 75 people thought this particular review was helpful, is a 1 star review.... all the comments of this review are saying stuff like 'couldn't agree more', 'spot on review', etc. I mean what gives here? I know some of the pov's are different but really? 1 star? I mean I can't see myself not reading this book, since I enjoyed the first one so much but whats the deal here?

I haven't read either book yet, but I just checked Amazon and was surprised. I haven't seen that kind of negativity on Goodreads or any of the forums that I visit. The only complaints I've really seen outside of Amazon are that there are more POV characters (which to me sounds like a good thing, but I haven't read Blood Song yet).

[Corvinus85]

Ok sorry I skipped to the bottom to try to avoid spoilers so sorry if this is being addressed. Loved the first one, didn't get a chance to read tower lord yet, but it's next on my list. Just checked the reviews over at amazon and I was a bit shocked. The 'most helpful' review where 75 people thought this particular review was helpful, is a 1 star review.... all the comments of this review are saying stuff like 'couldn't agree more', 'spot on review', etc. I mean what gives here? I know some of the pov's are different but really? 1 star? I mean I can't see myself not reading this book, since I enjoyed the first one so much but whats the deal here?

I liked the book, however, some of the points that one reviewer makes are really spot on. The reviewer is not actually pissed off that there are others POVs, but that all the POVs read as they are the same. I don't totally agree with this, but they are quite similar.

[Mexal]

Ok sorry I skipped to the bottom to try to avoid spoilers so sorry if this is being addressed. Loved the first one, didn't get a chance to read tower lord yet, but it's next on my list. Just checked the reviews over at amazon and I was a bit shocked. The 'most helpful' review where 75 people thought this particular review was helpful, is a 1 star review.... all the comments of this review are saying stuff like 'couldn't agree more', 'spot on review', etc. I mean what gives here? I know some of the pov's are different but really? 1 star? I mean I can't see myself not reading this book, since I enjoyed the first one so much but whats the deal here?

I liked the book, however, some of the points that one reviewer makes are really spot on. The reviewer is not actually pissed off that there are others POVs, but that all the POVs read as they are the same. I don't totally agree with this, but they are quite similar.

There is some truth to that, but I do think they read different enough with different scope elements that I never felt it was repetitive. But ultimately, it's a different type of book from the first and I think there is a lot of initial disappointment that the book doesn't read exactly the same as book 1 did since people really enjoyed following Vaelin's story and they probably expected the 2nd to be similar instead of the multiple POV, expanded scope book that it became. I don't think it's as good as Blood Song, but I certainly had no issue getting into the book and burning through it once it got going.