G.G. Vandagriff
Shadow Mountain
Release date: April 2, 2008
List price: $15.95 (320p)
ISBN: 978-1590388631
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Review - "The Arthurian Omen"
Reviewer: Cori Vella
Rating:
G.G. Vandagriff's The Arthurian Omen, a generic mystery cloaked by an interesting premise, fails to impress. Its title and summary suggest a more historically-based whodunnit, perhaps with some new insights or twists on a legend that has been around for centuries. Worth a read based on the plot summary found on the back of the book — but I suppose that's the point of the summary on the back, to convince a reader to buy it and give it a shot.
You fooled me, clever marketing people. Sucked me in, thinking I was going to get a neat little mystery wrapped in the Arthurian legend, but the text didn't deliver.
Instead of a fascinating read, what I got was a bland, watered-down version of a mystery (I think even Nancy Drew might have more suspense — that is saying something) that probably would have been best as a one-shot mood piece in a fanzine.
Maren Southcott's life gets a whole lot more complicated when her sister, a Celtic scholar, is murdered. Over what? A clue that may or may not lead to a priceless manuscript which may or may not prove the existence of King Arthur. That's a whole lot of risk for something that may or may not exist in the first place. Maren also has reason to believe that her husband may have had something to do with the murder, and when her daughter is kidnapped by a drug lord (with the manuscript as ransom), she has no choice but to try to find what her sister died looking for.
Traveling through Wales with a merry band of cops and suspects, Maren also becomes the target of a lunatic who thinks himself an important figure of Welsh history. She must find the manuscript, rescue her daughter, and do her best to stay alive.
One of the book's signficant flaws is in the characterization. In something as high-stake as a murder mystery, characters can't afford to not have sympathy from the reader. Without sympathy, the reader doesn't really care if the murder is solved or not. I found myself hoping that the lunatic would kill Maren, which is never a good sign. The writing is also quite poor — so purple in some passages that it borders on fan-fiction quality.
The ending felt rushed and — to be quite honest — somewhat idiotic. The trend in mystery TV shows and books lately is to give a slash-bang-boom ending: a complete and total shocker for the culprit, someone the reader never would have expected. The Arthurian Omen is one such book. While it is a good idea sometimes to think outside the box and stray from the formula, mysteries succeed because of the formula. It makes us readers feel important to be able to pick out clues, to follow along, to have our theories about whodunnit. If you deprive us of that chance, we feel cheated. We feel like you dangled a piece of chocolate cake in front of us, then fed us a piece of celery. You're clever, you thought of this "amazing" resolution that we mere readers would never have thought of — I get it. Keep your cleverness for some witty badinage with friends or colleagues, and let us readers feel like we've accomplished something by the end of the book. We stuck by you in the build-up, so you've got to deliver on the climax.
Not my cup of tea, but if you're interested in Welsh geography, the descriptions of the castles and monasteries are quite nice.
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