Title: The Golden Fountain
Author: Zuheb Alep
Genre: Middle Grade Fantasy
Publication Date: Feb 28th, 2018
Pages: 320 (Paperback)
Publishers: Troubador Publishing Ltd
Rating:
No rating
The Golden Fountain is the story of a twelve-year old Benjamin, a rebellious boy whose fierce desire to become a leader is threatened by the children disappearing around his city. The citizens of the city has long suffered their children’s disappearance, but the fact that they were never discovered leads Benjamin to finally decide one thing; he would creep on-board a ship carrying eight thousands soldiers to rescue them around the world.
This story is set parallel in a world to our own, with magical creatures such as talking snow-cats bred for war, winged humans with elemental powers, birds as large as a horse and ferocious witches.
This world is more than magical, with the balance of light and darkness about to break. Only Benjamin can prevent that with his unbreakable sword and a unique compass. Fall into a story completed with many themes, mostly about love and worst of all … death
DNF @ 55%
Okay, so some middle grade are for me and some aren’t and this is one that just isn’t.
First of there is basically no world building at all! You are just thrown into this parallel world to our own that makes no sense and then nothing is explained. Maybe it will be in the end but I just can’t force myself to push through another 150 pages when I don’t care. And yes this is parallel to our world, it’s basically our world but they slightly changed the spelling of everything and then threw some weird magical items in.
Examples of the names:
Book: Aradia, Egypta, Afrika, Europia, etc.
Real: Arabia, Egypt, Africa, Europe.
Okay next, I’m just bored. As there is no development or world building I can’t connect with characters & the world doesn’t interest me so I’m just bored reading about characters I don’t care about in a world that makes no sense.
Also this book is just constant action that makes no sense. Like I said, nothing is explained so we just jump from event to event with no reasoning as to why. Then that thing just ends without explanation and we move onto the next ridiculous thing.
Also there are so many characters!! Half of them we meet for like one chapter and then don’t hear about again. It’s impossible to keep track of everyone as there is just so many.
Then there is the similarities to other books & movies that I noticed. They aren’t big things but things like ‘Stellotape’ I have no idea why they didn’t just call it Sellotape when most of the other random objects in the book don’t get name changes. But ‘Stellotape’ reminded me straight away or ‘Spellotape’ from the Wizarding World. Next we have a magic compass that points to the thing you want most. Sound familiar?
Then there is the excessive use of Explanation marks. It’s not all the time but I noticed a heap of spoken sentence that had a ‘!’ behind it for no reason. Let me give you an example.
*Please be aware that this quote is from the ARC and may differ from the finished published work*
“What? No!” said Jordanna
SAID! SAID does not mean yelled. Make up your mind. Is she saying or yelling it. Like it just contradicts its self so often.
Then there is also the very abrupt description/observations of characters. Let me give you another quote.
He soon woke at the sound of Benjamin’s voice and began propping up his fat body
Uhm? Is that necessary? I suppose at least he didn’t say it out loud.
So overall, I am simply not enjoying this book and don’t want to continue. Also I’m just coming out of a reading slump and don’t want to force a not enjoyable book on myself right now!!
Also just a little warning. There is a fair bit of death, violence and abuse in this book. And it is marked at ‘Young Adult’ even though the main character is 12.
I was provided with an eGalley of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you very much to Troubador Publishing Ltd & NetGalley for this opportunity.
You can purchase a copy for yourself at any of the links below.
Troubador Publishing Ltd
Paperback
Book Depository
Paperback
Amazon (Aus)
Paperback / eBook
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