Just that it weakens my ability to judge the author on their possible imaginative merit.įrom a story-telling perspective, there was very little that I enjoyed at all about my reading experience here. I don’t think that being unable to discern the difference between the two lessens my possible enjoyment of the story at all. One of the down sides of having these new experiences though is that I’m completely ignorant of what pieces of the “new” have come directly from the imagination of the author, and which pieces have been lifted from the unfamiliar culture and merely inserted into the book. One of the reasons why I like reading books that include new cultures and histories is precisely because so much of it is new and exciting.

Consistently, the characters and beings and creatures that Tracker runs into put on display and show a wide range of possible imagination and fascinating thought. Some that want nothing more than to bed him.

Along the way, he runs into lots of interesting characters. The entirety of the story occurs as we follow Tracker across the land in search of this unknown boy. About halfway through the book, we find out that the boy might be a prince, and I guess that’s where the GoT reference comes in. One of these is a shape-shifter that morphs between man and Leopard. This man, Tracker, has a “nose” for finding the things that he seeks and is used to working alone, but in this instance agrees to travel with a group of other individuals. The setup in this first volume is that a boy was abducted about three years ago, and the main character has been tasked with finding him. Okay, I’d say that’s a pretty good primer for one of the most tedious books I’ve finished reading in a long, long time.īLACK LEOPARD, RED WOLF is the first book in a planned trilogy that is purported to be a collection of different perspectives surrounding the same series of events. How could I not take them up on that opportunity? At the time though, I somehow completely missed the fact that the author of this book… was actually on the panel. Well, not just any old list, but a list from Time Magazine of “The Best 100 Fantasy Books of All Time” put together by a selected panel of “well-esteemed” fantasy authors. But then it showed up on a list of books. Some people bandying it about as an “African Game of Thrones”. Prior to deciding to pick it up, I’d seen a decent amount of buzz about it making the rounds on social media. This concept has been rattling around in my brain ever since I started reading this book. I find it interesting just how wide and varied the opinions given for a single book can be.

Black leopard red wolf by marlon james