Picture drawn by Maggie Stiefvater, 2009. Header made by S.F. Robertson, 2010.

Friday, November 16, 2012

The City's Son by Tom Pollock

The City's Son by Tom Pollock
"Running away from her traitorous best friend and her distant father, teenage graffiti artist Beth Bradley is looking for a new home. What she finds is Filius, the ragged crown prince of London’s underworld—a place where glassy spiders steal voices on telephone wires, railwraiths terrorize the train tubes, and deadly scaffwolves stalk the shadows.

Reach, the malign god of demolition, is on a rampage, destroying the creatures of hidden London to lay claim to the skyscraper throne. Caught up in helping Filius raise an alleyway army to battle Reach, Beth soon forgets her old life. But when the enemy claims her best friend, Beth must choose between the acceptance she finds in the streets and the life she left behind."- summary from Amazon

First off, let me just say that I did really enjoy this book and I can't wait to read more. However, I do think it was a bit too long; I felt that not everything needed to be included and parts of it really dragged for me, leading me to almost drop the book a few times.

But it is a wonderfully constructed book in terms of the world-building. There's this dark, seedy underbelly to London and Pollock really brings to life these creatures, while subtly raising important issues of environmental protection, greed, etc. It was a really interesting way of doing that.

The characters are all fully developed and I really enjoyed reading their story, but it did take some time to get that point. So don't give up on it if you're reading it! Unless you, like, really hate the book, in which case put it down and read something you like.

Overall, a good debut and Pollock seems promising. When's book 2 coming out?

FTC: Received e-galley from Netgalley. Link above is an Amazon Associate link; any profit goes toward funding contests.

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