The King’s Peace by Kevin Hammond
Genre – Fantasy
Published 10/6/2013
Ages 14+
About the book – The King’s Peace, A Tale of Kings and Thieves
“The Kingdom is young and yet it stands in great peril. Dark tales of the unnatural have reached the King’s city. The King is slain in his bed and the storm on the horizon brings black ships closer to the coastal city of Erenon. Nathaniel, a clever thief has stumbled upon a job that brings him to the home of the King when he is slain and Nathaniel is unwillingly dragged into the quest to reach the southern garrison which has gone quiet in recent months. Strange powers are helping and hindering him and the small company of soldiers dispatched to that garrison as war comes to the city.
They will find those horrors that plague the common man, an ancient legend will unravel, and a deception so epic in scale it involves the Gods. The whole world of man and nations who live on the other side of the mountain range known as the Great Divide will come together in a war no one really understands and as the kingdom fights to survive it will face an enemy they know nothing about.” – Publisher Blurb
The Review – A Diamond in the Rough
Unfortunately, the formatting of the novel is a bit strange. At one time, we discussed a book’s formatting in every review. We stopped discussing it unless it became a distraction, and it is a distraction here. There is a line of extra space after every paragraph. Along with the indentation, it makes every paragraph stand out, and seems to pad the page length just a tad. As well, the chapter breaks are so understated, two lines sandwiching an emphasized title, that it can be hard to tell you made the transition.
There is no table of contents, in fact, aside from the cover, it doesn’t feel much like a book at all, just a story. At least it’s a pretty good story.
The Bright Side – The King’s Peace Awes
Many of our gripes are made up for by a good story paced well. For the length of the book, The King’s Peace keeps us entertained. It pulls us along to enjoy a tale that kept us intrigued, rose the occasional brow, and even impressed us. In short, we love the story Mister Hammond has made. We love his characters. We wish the dichotomy of good and evil was a little less pronounced, but it is not so terrible as to feel forced. Here, you have a story about good and evil. A story about gods and mortals. It is a fun ride that is sure to entertain the most hardcore of fantasy fans. After all, it left us wanting more.
The Rating – B –
In the end, we were torn. If we were rating stories here, this would have received a higher mark. However, we aren’t rating stories, we’re reviewing books. As a book, The King’s Peace has some room for improvement. How a story is experienced by the reader is nearly as important as the story itself. This serves as an example of how bad formatting can harm the delivery of even a good story. We had more than a couple moments when we realized we missed a chapter break. We found ourselves confused as scene jumped to scene without rhyme or reason. Now, the book is still easy to read, our confusion wasn’t as bad as we have seen in the past. Mister Hammond still writes cogently. He still describes a wonderful world. If he fixes the e-book formatting, we would even revise our review.
Our recommendation for any new author is don’t publish an e-book without reading one, published by a publishing house, to see what it ought to look like. First impressions are important for readers. They set the stage for all that is to come.
Do you want to read The King’s Peace? You can find it on Amazon.