DNF Audiobook Review – The Riddle (The Books of Pellinor, Book 2) by Alison Croggan (3/5 stars)
Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 19 hours and 7 minutes (512 pages)
Publisher: Candlewick on Brilliance Audio
Release Date: August 25, 2011
ASIN: B005J5SP1W
Stand Alone or Series: 2nd book in the Books of Pellinor series
Source: Audiobook from Audible.com
Rating: 3/5 stars
“Maerad is a girl with a tragic and bitter past, but her powers grow stronger by the day. Now she and her mentor, Cadvan, hunted by both the Light and the Dark, must unravel the Riddle of the Treesong before their fractured kingdom erupts in chaos. The quest leads Maerad over terrifying seas and vast stretches of glacial wilderness, ever closer to the seductive Winterking – ally of her most powerful enemy, the Nameless One. Trapped in the Winterking’s icy realm, Maerad must confront what she has suspected all along: that she is the greatest riddle of all.
This is the second book in the Books of Pellinor series. This is a very classic feeling adventure fantasy series. While I really loved the first book, I ended up stopping this book about 70% of the way through. The story just moved way too slow.
I listened to this on audiobook and between the soothing narrator and the slow pace of the story it kept putting me to sleep. Since I normally listen to audiobooks while driving, I decided to return it to audible…didn’t want to fall asleep while driving. So, while there wasn’t anything horribly wrong with the narration. it was just a bit too soothing sounding for me most of the time, I also still found the heroine’s voice to be too pinched sounding.
In this volume Maerad and Cadvan must hunt down the Treesong before the Dark can fully fracture the kingdom. Unfortunately, the journey will be a long and arduous one and Maerad will be tested every step of the way.
Although this did still have a classic adventure fantasy feel to it, I felt like this book was much much slower than the first one. I knew it was time to stop reading it when I started dreading getting in the car to listen to it. I think this is a book that might be better to physically read, so I may pick it up again in the future in paperback form.
I did continue to enjoy the Light vs Dark theme to the story. I also enjoyed watching Maerad grow into her magical powers. However, things just happen way too slowly and it took way too long to get back to the adventuring part. By the time things started to get interesting again I found I just didn’t care.
Overall this just was not for me, it just moved too slow. I did enjoy the classic adventure fantasy feel, but the slow pace ended up making me just not care about what was going on here. This was disappointing to me because I really loved the first book in this series. I may go back and revisit this book in paper format at some point but for now I am done with this series.