Official Review: Reign of Malice by Joseph Hendon

Hendmosaad89 · Post by **Hendmosaad89** » 24 Sep 2014, 13:22

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Reign of Malice" by Joseph Hendon.]

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I'm so blown away by this book; I don’t even know where or how to start. I'm so happy I got a chance to read and review this book.

This book's Genre is Fantasy. It is suitable for young adults. Reign of Malice is the first installment in the Malice trilogy series. All three books are already available on Amazon. It is Narrated in Third-person and First-person. I give this book 4 out of 4 stars.

In a world full of Elves, Dwarfs, Beasts, Ogres, Orcs, Mages and Humans; came the powerful Dark King that ripped the humans from their freedoms, eradicated the dwarfs from existence and forced the elves to go into hiding. After ages of running from fights or confrontations with the enemy; came Kevin a farm boy and unleashed his rage and malice upon all the enemies to take his vengeance for his first love's and family's murder. He isn’t a noble knight, he isn’t a hero. He is a cold-hearted killer who doesn’t object to carnage innocent lives along the way for his pursuit of revenge. His enemies should really look out, he was in a mood!.

I rated this book 4 star because it had all of the factors that made it a very successful book. The first factor is the book's opening. The beginning of the first chapter is usually where I judge the author's ability to catch my attention. So I must admit and say that the opening of this book didn’t just capture my attention thoroughly, it brought forth an emotion from me so early in the book, and that surprised me. I felt anticipation and apprehension from the first page to the last and that was just brilliant. I liked the perfect input of history and culture, they each were written in an admirable quantity and they flowed smoothly. The cultures, rules and traditions for each race were beautifully organized.

The second factor is the suitability of the pace. If the pace is too fast or too slow it can cause the reader enough displeasure to leave the book unfinished. The author here in this book did jump from days to weeks and from months to years, but each and every jump was because there was repentance in the events, nothing important happened.

The third factor is the plot and this one was brilliant. I loved it. From the very first page I had no idea what was going to happen or when. The author made it very clear from the beginning of this book; that he doesn’t do the predictable, the plot isn’t about a prince running for his life and trying to save his girl. Here, the hero is actually running towards the fight and is determined to end it once and for all, even if it costs his life. What I liked most about the author's writing style is that he was bold enough to change the usual path these stories constantly take. He tried a new path and was willing to take the risk. I admired that! The author's imagination expressed in this book was pure art.

The character building was well written. I saw him grow from being naive to angry, from being in pure indifference to being somewhere logical, from being impatient to tolerating some amount of patience, and finally to being sensible and loving.

Humor is a very important factor for me. Laughing makes the reading experience just more entertaining, and that is the whole reason why I read books in the first place. I must just confess just how much I laughed in this book. Even though it had lots of death and tragedy, the author managed to make me laugh out loud, quite literally!. I loved the humor of the protagonist throughout the whole book, every time he says he was in a mood; I burst out laughing. Also the way he was being sarcastic about his horse was just awesome. I managed to actually like the horse! Imagine that!.

The theme was mainly family and honor, I loved that there are still some books out there that tackle the topic of family. And state how important your family should be to you.

Minor (drawbacks) must also be mentioned. Although the writing style was great, the merging between first-person narrative to third-person narrative: caused me some major confusion in the beginning. The author would go back and forth in the same "paragraph" from first of the third. This just made me lose track of who was saying what. However, it wasn’t too confusing that it would prevent me finishing the book or giving it a lower rate. After I got used to his writing style, it became easier and smoother to follow the plot. Furthermore, there were some spelling and grammatical errors. But too much though.

Finally, I highly advise the author to shorten the chapters a bit and write each narrative in a chapter by itself or at least draw a line between the two narratives like some authors do. I advise him to consider writing comedy books, I really believe that he has high potential in this genre; he would be brilliant among the romantic comedy authors out there. If he made me Laugh a lot in a fantasy book filled with tragedy, action and violence, imagine how many more times he could make me laugh in a romantic comedy book!.

At last, I won't say that I'm looking forward to read from this author again because I already plan on buying the next two installments right now. I truly enjoyed reading this book. I hope I read more books from this author in the future.

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Buy "Reign of Malice" on Amazon

Stevefromtheblock · Post by **Stevefromtheblock** » 27 Feb 2015, 17:49

Thank you for a nice, detailed review.

Hendmosaad89 · Post by **Hendmosaad89** » 02 Mar 2015, 12:24

Thank you very much, I appreciate it:)

debo9967 · Post by **debo9967** » 08 Mar 2015, 11:23

A very, well reasoned review. The book sounds gripping.

MikiMirjana · Post by **MikiMirjana** » 08 Mar 2015, 12:20

This review is truly great. I love fantasy books and this sounds quite interesting. Surely I will read it one of these days.

Hendmosaad89 · Post by **Hendmosaad89** » 08 Mar 2015, 12:42

Thank you both very much, I truly appreciate your compliments:). Yes, this book is one of the few books I reviewed that effectively grabbed my full attention from start to finish.
I love fantasy books as well. I love reading new angles /inputs of imaginations and creativity . I get to enter a whole new world!:)

Cee-Jay Aurinko · Post by **Cee-Jay Aurinko** » 09 Mar 2015, 03:21

I like the style of your review. You don't go too much in the plot, but dissect the novel's strong/weak points thoroughly.

On the matter of comedy playing an important part in readers loving what they read, I think you're also spot-on. Books that let you escape and make you laugh on the way is what makes books memorable. Even darker reads should contain some humor. Blood, blood, and more blood simply won't do on its own.

Thankx again. I feel like I should give this novel a try.

Hendmosaad89 · Post by **Hendmosaad89** » 09 Mar 2015, 04:36

Thank you so much. you just gave me a very needed boost for my confidence about my reviewing skill, I appreciate it.
I just realised that I cant read a book without analyzing it. If I didnt get to say anything about it, i would just go crazy!. Yes of course I totally agree with you, any book that made me laugh out loud isnt forgettable to me what soever. And that book surprised me with its great humor.
I had a readly good time reading it. If you do give it a shot, please tell me your opinion.