Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan
(Legends of the First Empire, Book 1)
Released: June 28, 2016 | Genre: Epic Fantasy
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Since time immemorial, humans have worshipped the gods they call Fhrey, truly a race apart: invincible in battle, masters of magic, and seemingly immortal. But when a god falls to a human blade, the balance of power between humans and those they thought were gods changes forever.
Now only a few stand between humankind and annihilation: Raithe, reluctant to embrace his destiny as the God Killer; Suri, a young seer burdened by signs of impending doom; and Persephone, who must overcome personal tragedy to lead her people. The Age of Myth is over. The time of rebellion has begun.
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Michael Sullivan had to start the book over because his wife hated the writing style. He had deliberately adopted a lofty, archaic style inspired by Homer, but she pointed out that it wasn’t really his voice. He agreed, scrapped what he’d written, and started again in a more natural style.
REVIEW
⭐ ⭐ ☆ ☆ ☆
I tried. I really tried. But it's so BORING.
Re-Review
I’m standing by my original 2-star rating. Sadly, not even GraphicAudio could save this drag of a book.
I really wanted to like Age of Myth, and I gave it every chance possible. I tried reading it, I tried listening to the audiobook, and after both left me bored enough to DNF, I gave one final attempt with the GraphicAudio version. While I did finally finish it, the experience remained an uneventful disappointment.
The last 5% of the book had some promise, but it wasn’t nearly enough to make up for the 95% struggle it took to get there.
As I mentioned in my original review, you can have all the worldbuilding and character development you want, but at some point, something needs to happen. Considering how slow this book moves, and knowing it’s the first of a planned five-book series, I’m not optimistic that the story won’t be drawn out to an extreme.
Original Review
DNF.
I made it about halfway through the book (which, given its length, is roughly equivalent to a full standard novel) before realizing how dull it was. I kept pushing, hoping something exciting would happen, but there was no sign of it anytime soon. Knowing this is the start of a five-book series, I feared the story would be unnecessarily stretched out even further.
Age of Myth falls into the familiar trap of many epic fantasy novels: worldbuilding and character development take precedence over story. While those elements are important, eventually, something needs to happen. When a novel becomes all exposition and no substance, it stops being a story and becomes… well, Fictional Non-Fiction (yes, I just made that up).
