In my top 5 books is The Orcadian Novels by Stuart Wakefield – Body of Water and Memory of Water, the 3rd book to come is Spirit Of Water – there’s a theme don’t you know!
Define it:-
This series is complete with action ~ romance ~ myth ~ fantasy ~ hot guys [what? Is that not a theme?] ~ m/m ~ life ~ drama and family connections. Stuart Wakefield encompasses so many different themes into his books but it all flows together smoothly and each one gets the attention it deserves for such a short novels.
What’s the story:-
This story is based around Leven who only knows 2 things about himself and his life, he’s called Michael (Leven is his nickname) and he has never been allowed near water that is open to the elements i.e. rivers and the sea. He doesn’t know the reason for this and as he lives with an adopted family has no one to ask that might know the answer.
Body Of Water follows Leven through his journey to find out who he is, who he loves and who his real family was/is. This journey takes some strange turns when he ends up in the Orkney Islands to see his real father and hopefully get some answers, this also takes him to Dom and his struggles with the world. Memory of Water continues the story and takes you deeper into Leven’s world through the other characters.
For the myth and fantasy elements of these books (without giving too much away) there are ‘fin-men’ [mermen] /seals – selkies / earth spirits / ghosts / other sea creatures and magical powers all connected by a core of Norse mythology.
Love:-
Even though Memory of Water [book 2] is the main action bringer out of the two, you can still feel the love between the characters and Stuart didn’t forget the simple things unlike many other authors out there, this one keeps track of every aspect of the story line. In this book you still get the romance Stuart is so good at; but in this one the story really starts to kick off – with action on every page along with emotional turmoil of one of the characters which is described so elegantly despite the theme.
If you haven’t guessed already, I’m addicted to this series and to be honest if I have to read these books every week for the rest of my life, then I wouldn’t mind in the slightest [currently I’ve read them 3 times]. I fall in-love with them every time I read them and still ‘see’ all the things that I ‘saw’ the first time of reading. By ‘see’ and ‘saw’ – I mean that the way Stuart describes scenes; event; characters etc etc.. I can literally see it play out in my head. These books need to be a film.
Flaws: –
Of course there are flaws, you will never have a perfect book – its just not possible. The flaw with these books are that they are too short, so much could get added in to create a death defying collection of novels that are literally never ending. Like Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. Ah immense enjoyment!
What else; I guess anything else would just go with the length of the books, if they were longer then Stuart could go into more depth about the history of the characters, and why they do what they do etc. Although these things are mentioned you could always have a little more background [insert time jump]. This would give him more chance to let the characters breathe into their situations, explore their surroundings – literally and figuratively.
Go find him:-
I highly recommend these books and anything else this author produces (he also has a short story called Isali Dreams [as it happens] :-p which he joint wrote) and if you’re not blown away by it and suddenly addicted I’d be bewildered .. well I guess there’s always one!
If your looking for a sweet strange mythical amusing AND saucy book.. its right here
So.. are you still with me ?? Great! .. The reason for me posting this now, is that I get to have an exclusive Q & A session with him!! Like, seriously! I – ME! – get to ask him – author – ‘loads’ of questions and he WILL answer (whether he likes it or not) – That is how they work right? 😉 ..stay around for the Q&A sesh with him very very soon.. even if you’re not to interested in his books (crazy!) then appreciate a talk with an author about random things and some occasional serious questions!
) Anyway.. the description, what I look for is one that makes me feel like I’m getting ahead of the game by reading it. Like it’s some juicy gossip about the book that I’m getting for free! You know what I mean?? Just be careful not to over dramatize the book and leave me thinking that the blurb was the best part.
nixcean 