Product Description

The comfortable world of Martris Drayke, second son of King Bricen of Margolan, is shattered when his older half-brother, Jared, and Jared Foor Arontala, kill the king and seize the throne. Tris is the only surviving member of the royal family aside from Jared the traitor. Tris flees with three friends: Soterius, captain of the guard; Carroway, the courtd; and Harrtuck, a member of the royal guard. Tris harbors a deep secret. In a land where spirits walk openly and influence the affairs of the living, he suspects he may be the mage heir to the power of his grandmother, Bava K¿aa, once the greatest sorceress of her age. Such magic would make Tris a Summoner, the rarest of magic gifts, capable of arbitrating between the living and the dead.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9440 in Books
• Published on: 2007-01-30
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 640 pages

About the Author
Gail Martin has worked with non-profit and for-profit organizations in many industries. She is an adjunct professor for UNC Charlotte and a part-time instructor for Central Piedmont Community College who teaches public speaking, continuing education (marketing topics) and public relations writing. She is an award winning writer with articles and stories published throughout the US.

Customer Reviews

Vaguely interesting, but lame
This book, as well as book 2 "The Blood King", were recommended to me by Amazon. While they usually give me good suggestions, I feel that this particular purchase was a waste of money. The story is poorly written, there's no other way to say it. There are some fascinating themes and characters, but they're all so wooden and stereotypical, the whole thing resembles one of those dreadful European fantasy movies on basic cable. Unless cheesy B-movies like "Bloodrayne" and "Gryphon" appeal to you, you'd be better off looking elsewhere for your fantasy fix.

Right from the start, the story just seems shallow and formulaic. And though a fantasy story doesn't necesarily have to be realistic, there are some elements here that are just weak. For example, I find it difficult to accept the idea of a prince, a well-traveled master bard, and the captain of the castle guard all being 19 years old and best friends. As the story progresses, the stale dialogue and clumsy progression does little to make you keep reading. Even the battles are poorly described. And I could swear that the general plot is basically a hodgepodge of other popular fantasy stories (work from Tad Williams, Terry Goodkind, etc.)

The only good parts of this book are some of the depictions of magic, which are somewhat creative and well described. However, these can't rescue the story from itself.

Paint By Numbers Fantasy
Don't get me wrong, I like paint by numbers fantasy. A paperback novel telling the tale of a young hero who must right wrongs and save the kingdom is a great way to kill time on an airplane, commute, or relaxing on the beach. But only if the author is good at it.

The author of 'The Summoner,' Gail Martin, is not very good at it.

Given that this is PbNF, I didn't expect much when I picked it up on a whim recently. I expected the cardstock characters (evil usurper, dark wizard adviser, plucky princess, bardly bard, etc) and Hero's Journey plot checklist. I just didn't expect it to be so... inept.

The book is too long, first of all. We all know where stories like this are going, so why spend so much time messing around? It's not like there's any character development or anything, so it feels like the author's just yanking our chains for a few hundred pages.

Hint: If you're telling a paint by the numbers fantasy story, your page cap is 400. 300 would be better. 600 is fail. I mean, this is a series, right? Save some for book 2.

The characters are cardboard cutouts of cardboard cutouts. If you have seen one fantasy movie, read one fantasy book, or played one game of D&D, you know them all instantly. The only interesting twist, the main character is like the kid form the Sixth Sense and can see ghosts, is reduced to a chore as he spends most his time whining about it.

Hint: If you spend the more of a fight scene describing how your hero is shocked and aghast at killing a dude instead of describing the actual fight, you're doing it wrong.

Hint: People don't like their characters to be willfully stupid. If the captain of the guard can't do anything about suspicious activity surrounding the king, then perhaps he shouldn't be a captain, huh?

The setting is Standard Fantasy. Again, no problems there, but nobody needs the Geography 101 Info Dump or the Intro to Theology course we get once the quest finally gets underway.

Hint: Don't introduce new cultures/faiths by telling us. Show them so as to make them more real for the reader.

Hint: Of course, if your idea of showing involves long descriptions of boring rituals performed by standard Spunky Princess #2 (Now, with cute animal companion!), maybe you should just skip it all together.

Bottom line is, this book would have been much better for what it is if it were half as long and twice as well written. That way reading 'The Summoner' by Gail Martin would be more rewarding and less like trying to eat a bag of marshmallows - too long, too safe, too sickly sweet.

Amateurish waste of time
Easily the worst book I've tried to read in the past five years. Some books are fast reads because the pace whirls you along; others are fast because absolutely nothing happens. This book is unfortunately one of the latter. Normally I give a book 100 pages before giving up on it. For this one, I got to 75 and simply couldn't take any more.

The author's style is amateurish and shallow, with nothing paid attention to beyond the most cursory details. To a one, every single character can be described in five words or less, and each is a stereotype lifted from bad movies and the writings of adolescent pretenders: charming captain of the guard, standard-issue bard, evil patrocidic maniacal prince, and so on. You never get to know any more about the characters because at every opportunity for reflection, interaction, or development, the author instead chooses to gloss over things, plunging on to the next thinly described vignette in which nothing happens.

If nothing else, this novel demonstrates that one need have no real talent to get published.