Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #626282 in Books
• Published on: 1999-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 208 pages

Customer Reviews

Fiction for an African Consciousness! A Must read!
I just fininshed this book today and I am going to reread it again all over again just to feel myself immersed in the world of Memnon once more! I read fiction and fantasy as a young black youth and it has always been a love of mine. At one point I stopped reading fantasy books because I guessed at the time that I outgrew them. Later in life I began rethinking history, the bible and everything fed to my mind from a child onward about myself, my (multidimensional) culture and where I fit into the grand scheme of world developement. Because of this, I now realize that I lost interest in fantasy works, even on TV, because there were NO black men or women or children in leading roles period. I also realize that not too many African Americans on a whole are inclined to read fantasy or fiction and what is read is usually what is pushed in the main market: Books about cheating, the oversexed female, thugs to millionaires and so on, but nothing to really spark the imagination.

As I began to study trance, stories and how they can unconsciously structure the personality of the reader or listener, making information easier to process and integrate, I searched all over the net for black fiction writers of fantasy bnecause I have just about had my fill of non-fiction books on just information. I began to feel, thanks to observing my wife and how much she reads and has more spark to her, that I was sacrificing my true portal to the spirit within, my imagination. My wife is a bookaholic when it comes to fiction and I am greasing the old gears to fire up that inner vision again. But the books I have read or try to just don't do it. THIS book does! It could be because of the many authors and writings from other cultures as well as my own dealing with esoteric and spritual knowledge, but the ACTION and image-creating language in this book has awakened that inner vision!!

It is my goal now to acquire all books in the series because I KNOW the power of stories and Myths and how they can build and hold together the minds of a family/culture in spirit, in the dream worlds. I am hooked on this book because as a black man, this charachter spoke directly to me for a change! I wasn't just a spectator, I was Memnon! Very empowering! I may even begin to write myself, why not? If you are black especially, but of any culture GET THIS BOOK! Memnon is African yet he experiences many different cultures and evils, evil has no color preference so this book is not about Black over White, but for the black male searching for a hero to identify with this is it!

Shades of Memnon, my thoughts
I am a fan of fantasy adventure novels. Mainly reading a lot of the conan series. The thing is that in many of those books the heros aren't people of color. And when people of color, black people in particular, were brought up in the books their portrayal was ... well somewhat WACK. The protrayal in those books captured and grew out of the sterotypes that the European and American society has of Africa. For this book the author (a black man)spent 10 years studying anthropolgy, myth, and history so that his portral would be coming from a base of knowledge in the culture of ancient Kamit. Refrences are made throughout the book to Kamitian legends, concepts, and spritual culture. These references are in a little glossary at the begining of the book, so the reader can easily follow along. I enjoyed reading this book and finished within the week that I recieved it. The character of Memnon was well developed along with the plot. The author did not over glorify balck people while making villanins and savages out of white people. A mistake I was worried about when pruchasing the book. Instead the book tried and succeeded in presenting a story where Memnon found both friend and foe in both shades. The fight scences are pretty damn sweet. And I look forward to Memnon who has just aquired some knew weapons rippin' it up in the up coming books. This is the frist review I have written and I have been shoping here for a while so I was quite pleased. But I feel I should mention somethings I didn't like about the book. I felt the way in which Memnon came into captive the second time was type corny. It was just too easy. I think that is all i can say without giving the story away. So nuff Love. Peace and Blessing. ---Rain ninatakawewe@yahoo.com

Wonderful book
Shades of Memnon is a spellbinding, exciting, intriguing,mesmerising first book in a tale of epic proportions. It has all of the elements peculiar to the sword and sorcery genre: a gallant hero, nubile beauties, an evil wizard and benevolent fairies. The author, however, maximizes these elements through superlative storytelling that submerges the reader in a world he captures in stunning detail. The hero is no cardboard cutout with stock muscles and a sword, but a figure whose full humanity is conveyed even as he undergoes a transition from an ordinary youth to a warrior of superhuman strength and endurance. This book is a thrill ride of an adventure from beginning to end.