The Unseen Promise (Tarkeenia Saga Bk 1)

A nation’s king lies dying.  Leadership of the mages is tenuous at best.  A teenage boy is accused of a murder he did not commit, causing him to become a dark god’s pawn, and a traitor is rallying the deadliest of enemies. There is distrust between the races of Tarkeenia, but if they do not learn to work together, none will survive the horrifying hunger that is coming to consume them all.  

The Unseen Promise is an ambitious undertaking to be the author’s first novel.  Ms. Franklin has created the brand new world of Tarkeenia and introduces readers to a large cast of characters that includes new races such as Murrdocks – human/animal hybrids - and flesh-eating cave dwellers known as Specks, as well as the more familiar mages, dwarves, and sprites. What is sorely lacking is the presence of a sympathetic hero to root for. The reader is following the story of Roedanth, a young man falsely accused of murdering his brother. However, Roedanth escapes his pursuers quickly, and from then on his purpose is unclear.  The absence of a clearly defined “hero’s quest” is keenly felt. Some serious editing is needed to ferret out numerous sentences and sentence fragments that use awkward language or just flat-out don’t make sense, but there are also glimpses of some truly beautiful and well-written passages sprinkled throughout.  The author’s imagination and creativity seem boundless, and with a bit more work, this could become a solid beginning to a new fantasy saga.  

Leslie Stokes