The Unraveling of Wentwater by C.S. Lakin

With a twist on the familiar tales of sleeping beauty and rumpelstillskin combined C.S. Lakin tells the story of Teralyn, a girl of great beauty and skill with music, who was foretold as a babe to cause the destruction of Wentwater before her eighteenth birthday. For her own survival she was hidden away in the mountains surrounding the superstitious village, but on a visit to the little town below she meets a man that will change her life, but will also cause the destruction of the village.

The story of Wentwater features Teralyn, a gifted girl who goes through great lengths to save the town of Wentwater. I feel that her character started out very well shaped and strong, developed throughout, and carried through till the end; showing Mrs. Lakins skill. The young man Former is Teralyn’s lover and I honestly feel he should have been better shaped, we learn of his character and such, but for his roll in the story, which is a large roll, he was underdeveloped. Honestly, at first review of the book I was surprised to see how much the plot rotated around him. The amount of time given to him is minimal, causing him to be slightly on the “flat” side. The person I connected to the most was Justyn, which is odd but true. Justyn is an educated young man from the Heights—a college like set up in the mountains near Wentwater—who has left his superstitious family in the village to learn all that he can about the physical world. I understood his views and, though I didn’t agree with his reactions to his circumstances, to a degree sympathize with him.
The book’s pace started out nicely, though it dragged slightly through the middle “The Unraveling of Wentwater” ended with a quicker pace for the reader. As far as originality goes for a fairy tale I thought the book was well done. There were enough things that remind one of the fairy tales we have grown up on, the Sleeping Beauty beginning and the Rumpelstillskin like ending for example, but it with the unique characters and other features Lakin had me wondering and interested from cover to cover. The story felt homey, and familiar but with twists that kept it fresh; the book is perfect for a relaxing read before bed.
In Mrs. Lakin’s past books she had written great plots that tie up all the lose ends and I was slightly disappointed to find this story didn’t. I was left with a couple of questions, menial questions granted, but the lack of understanding of bits of the story took away from the overall enjoyment of “The Unraveling of Wentwater”.

C.S. Lakin has once again written a wonderful story that isn’t a fast pace action novel but more of a wondering walk of enjoyment for a person to relax to. Though not my favorite in “The Gates of Heaven Series”, “The Unraveling of Wentwater” still is a wonderful book showing great writing style.

B

The Land of Darkness by C.S. Lakin

Jadiel is a young 12 year old girl who loves her father and misses her mother, who died the year before. On top of grief for her mother she has to deal with her new step-mother, Huldah, and her two daughters. Huldah quickly feels the need to put Jadiel in her place making her do difficult house chores. Still the witch, Huldah, doesn’t like Jadiel taking up time with her new husband and his wealthy estate. To get rid of this nuisance she devises ways to kill young Jadiel. After a couple attempts Huldah comes up with an impossible mission; find the Tree of Youth and bring back a satchel full of its leaves. If she doesn’t Jadiel’s beloved father will die at the next full moon.
Only thing is… no one knows where this tree is, or if it even exists. 
Callen, a young carpenter discovers some old drawings of a bridge, a magnificent bridge, unfortunately no one knows who made it. Determined to find this bridge and learn of it’s creator Callen takes leave of his apprenticeship to find it.
Only thing is… no one knows where this bridge is, or if it even exists. 
These two seekers find each other on the road, Callen fearing for the young girls safety (Who just happens to be his apprentor’s niece.) Offers to help Jadiel with her mission to save her father. Traveling across the land they learn of the bridge’s creator, the Tree of Youth and so much more.

Once again I was entrapped in the wondrous realm of Sherbourne and it's surrounding lands. The hidden magic the world holds and the innuendoes to the previous 2 books — The Wolf of Tebron and The Map Across Time, in the Gates of Heaven Series by C.S. Lakin — had me feeling at with home with The Land of Darkness.

The speed of this tale is one of Lakin's best. The Land of Darkness starts out a bit slow and cumbersome but when I reached part two I was having trouble putting this adventure down. I was blown away at how easily Lakin places facts and stories from other books of the Gates of Heaven series in her stories yet they can be read as stand alone novels. Seeing references to Adian, Tebron and other things would just make me smile.
Now the main tale is about Jadiel and her conflict with Huldah. But Callen had his own villain stalking him a Golgoth, the dark creature from another world that can kill armies in a matter of days. This added a great twist and suspense to the plot, giving it a more grown up feel to your normal fairy tale yet keeping it very friendly for younger readers.
C.S. Lakin also did a wonderful job of laying the mood of the story and scenes. Many times I would find myself holding my breath hoping Callen wouldn’t open the door or wanting to jump for joy when Jadiel was freed from the slavers.  At other times I was irritated at the characters for not understanding, or practically yelling at them trying to tell them to believe.

The characters in this book had as much personality as the other books in this series. From talking boars and frogs, to the strange man constantly speaking in riddles.

I enjoyed this book and am extremely thankful to C.S. Lakin for giving me an advanced copy of her latest tale.

A+

The Wolf of Tebron by C.S. Lakin

Thanks to Living Ink Publishers for giving me this book to review.

Joran is a simple black smith, but when his wife vanishes for apparently no reason he feels guilty. He will attempt traveling to the 4 corners of the earth to find her with only a lone wolf to guide him.   

As soon as I started reading this book I was enchanted. With bright, colorful, and diverse characters you will smile or even laugh out loud at their charisma.
Joran is realistic, he deals with the faults that everyone does, anger, loneliness, fear, despair and much more. He will connect to everyone in any part of his walk through life. Ruyah  is there to help Joran with this journey. Ruyah is a wise wolf who spouts advice that is so true it is annoying, yet at times he acts like a giant puppy.  The secondary characters were enjoyable and thought provoking. Lakin did a nice job with all of the characters in this book, making everyone special.

The plot wasn’t action packed, which I found it relaxing. Since “The Wolf of Tebron” is about 250 pages long I felt it didn’t need to have a very fast plot to get me through it. It was an enjoyable read. At times though, it did seem as if the plot was starting to feel a little repetitive. Just as I was about to really get tired of it the plot changed. I was amazed at the timing. She gave flashbacks when needed, gives insight when wanted and covered great topics in “The Wolf of Tebron”. The lessons she covered in this book are so wide that I can’t even write down most of them. I will have to re-read this book to get a better understanding of only the lessons in this book.  To me this book is more like a long parable than the title “Fairy Tale” given on the cover.

I didn’t have any problem with this but I would like to notify you that this book includes magic, and something some might miss interpret as ideas of ‘mother earth’.  The way it was done was fine, maybe a little confusing but still good. 

I really enjoyed this book, it was fresh, entertaining, humorous, thought provoking and all around great.   

A