Review: Demons of the Past by Erin Durante

I posted an excerpt to this book last week, which you can link to here: Demons of the Past.

I received a copy of the second book in this series, Stones of Time, from a contest at Goodreads. I hadn't had a chance to start reading it yet when I received this book, the first of the Damewood trilogy, in the mail the following week. I wasn't expecting it, so it was a pleasant surprise, especially because I'm the type of person that likes to read an entire series, in order, when possible. As I read the premise of the book, though, I wasn't sure it was something that I would enjoy, but I decided to give it try.

Princess Nadia is used to court life, castles, princes, the whole bit plus the occasional foray out of the castle to practice her demon fighting skills. Her life is turned upside down when there is a siege on her castle and she (disguised as a knight), along with her horse/best friend, a Kelpie named Vestro, hit the road and join with a crew heading to Ferrington Pass to try to restore order to their quickly crumbling society. Sounds kind of like a typical quest story, right?

Wrong! This story takes place four hundred years after the world has become so technologically advanced that a third world war had erupted and caused it to return to an earlier style of feudal living. Princess Nadia grabs things, during her escape, from the castle Wizard's "lab", unusual things she has never seen before. She has no idea what a lab actually is or what the item is called that has a push down lever with a small wheel that, when activated, emits a flame (that's right, folks, a lighter.)

As I began reading this story, the first thing I noticed was the bad job of proofing that had been done throughout the book. (I'm sorry, I'm a nitpick about grammar and spelling mistakes, that's just the way it is.) I gave myself a pep-talk about how this was the author's first book and moved on (I still mentally edited as I read - it's a compulsion.)

I enjoyed the character development; the two men that are vying for Nadia's attention and her struggles to sort out her own feelings. There were definitely some surprises in the story and, I will give it to Erin Durante, the ending shocked me.

For a first book, I think the story was well planned and fun. There are struggles and fights but also bad pick up lines and a new way to look at things we take for granted in today's society. I'm actually anxious to get into the second book to see where the storyline is headed.

For more information on Erin Durante and the Damewood Trilogy, check out her website here: Enter Damewood

Thoughtful Thursdays

Here's a meme hosted by He Followed Me Home that talks about how books transform our own lives into something different as we read them. When I was younger (and very shy) books were how I dealt with life; I didn't have to deal with real people if my head was in a book. Now, that I'm older and better equipped to deal with the big, bad world, I use books to take me away to a different time/place when actual travel or change of circumstance isn't possible. It's a freedom from the mundane experience of every day life.

This week I'm a princess in a feudal society of the future. The world had become so technologically advanced and overrun with demons that a third world war changed everything, causing the people to revert back to an early way of life (with some magical tech gadgets thrown in.) I've been exposed to court life, with grand ballrooms and princes, etc., and had to flee for my life as my castle was overthrown by the opposers to this "new" way of life. (Coincidentally, I now have a moat in my real life residence. In truth, it's the water tank and air conditioner that have been leaking causing a flood towards the drain which I have to jump over to reach my basement digs, but it adds to the castle illusion, don't you think?)

As my personal moat dries up and I'm nearing the end of Demons of the Past, I look forward to my next adventures as a forensic anthropologist and a teenage singer (not in the same book;-))

Where did your book(s) take you this week? Post a comment and a link on your own blog to this post to let me know and pass on the word. Happy adventuring!

Book Excerpt - Demons of the Past by Erin Durante

Demons of the Past: Book One of the Damewood Trilogy by Erin Durante

From the back cover:

MODERN CIVILIZATION HAS DISINTEGRATED

The technological advances of mankind have flourished beyond expectations and escaped the controlling hands of the human race. Cloned humans and genetically engineered creatures prowl the lands, pushing the earth over the edge to a third World War.

Four centuries later, the world has regressed to a feudalistic state, unaware of its advanced past. Now, the kingdoms live in fear of mutated "demons", of shadowy forests, and of frosts destroying their spring crops. It is a land where only the secret of society's past is known by a select few - and those few seem to have their own agenda on the upcoming successions of thrones.

Nadia, the eldest princess of Damewood, flees for her life after her castle is attacked by an underground cult bent on bringing society back to its "roots". Disguising herself as a knight, she joins a hunting party along with her best friend - a demon horse named Vestro with his own dark past - to put an end to the massacres and retrieve a stolen key that will unlock the cult's mysteries and the history of her people.