Arcane (The Arinthian Line Book 1)

Arcane is the first entry in the initial series of five books. I found it to probably be the best of the 5 novels, but please, don’t let that fool you. I devoured the entire series in a weekend where I saw very little sun and ordered pizza to avoid interruptions (I might have shown up to work without sleeping). If you are looking for some light casual reading or an fun fantasy romp, this is it.

I riveting book. I couldn't put it down, reading late into the night several nights until I finally finished it. Some books are slow to get going and hard to relate to the characters, not so with this book. I couldn't wait to get started on the second book, which I had thankfully already downloaded.

Don't know when I have enjoyed reading 5 books in a row before. But any one of them was a great experience. This author is terrific. I was completely lost in his world, even as I was in the famous Valdemar books by Mercedes Lackey. I will be eagerly awaiting many more by this extremely talented writer.

I describe the characters as developed, but that isn't exactly true. They are still caricatures, but they lean more to being developed than being one-dimensional. Bridge is the straight man, with zero sense of humor, Leera is the cut up, always telling a joke, then taking it too far, then apologizing when Bridge says it wasn't funny. Aug is... just there. There isn't really much to say about it, though the story is told from his point of view.

The way they interact with each other is strange. Whenever someone wants to do something they always ask the others in their group, then go by majority to decide if they should. Really? Do they really have to vote? Can they do nothing by themselves? Which brings me to another point. All except Bridge are incredibly lazy. Aug learns that the world has arcanery, and through a wonderful twist of fate, finds that he can practice the arcane art, but him and the group never do until Mrs. Stone tells them too. They have a world filled with magic, and that magical knowledge conveniently explained, in depth in a book, in their language, that they simply have to read, and they don't until told to. It's almost like they wait until the plot tells them they need a new power. And bad guys seem to only be bad because the plot says so. Robin and Dap are bad people according to the story, but the prince who acts much the same as both of them, is supposed to be good apparently, because Bridge keeps suggesting to give him another chance. (SPOILER IN NEXT SENTENCE sorta) And I'm just sitting here thinking, he constantly threatens to have people flayed, and I'm supposed to chalk that up to loneliness and immaturity? No!

Lastly, the author seems to be afraid to let the story stay in one place for any amount of time.

Spoilers ahead:

Aug starts in a village that gets burned. He escapes in a storm, and starts staying with Mrs. Stone and meets some friends from a neighboring village. Learns maybe one or two spells, then the village is attacked and the trio escapes. Mrs. Stone finds a castle with plenty to explore and plenty of adventures to be had by the trio. They have gained, maybe intermediate success in three more spells and are already talking about needing to use a portal to escape. Can the story stay in one location for a while, without some big looming threat or need to evacuate coming up?

You may be wondering why I still gave it three stars if I hate it so much. And the simple answer is, I don't. It has pretty much everything a good story has for me. Magic in a strange and new land. A threat that seems far away now, but will soon be imminent. Flying. This may seem too specific to you, and it is, but every magical book that I loved had some form of flying. Stormlight Archive books had a form of flying that comes from altering gravity. The Wakening Book, although it isn't exactly flying has a sort of gliding power. Flying gives the protagonist a sense of freedom in the world, and officially widens the gap between what is normal, and what is magical and leaves the reader with a sense of wonder and freedom. It's just that the other things in the story that I mention are too glaring for me to rate this higher.

P.S. Can we get smart protagonists finally? The Wakening Book has a pretty good example of a smart protagonist, though he isn't very consistent with it. I've grown tired of protagonists that are supposed to be special in some way, while never showing anything but an average competence. That luck their way through the story. I mean Aug even says that him saving them once was luck, and I agree, but does he practice more spells, so that he will be able to protect his friends in the future? No, he still waits to be told to do so.

I'll continue reading the other books in the series, mainly because I want to see if those things change as they grow up, and start to develop personalities outside their group At which point, I'll come back to the comments to herald Bronny as a literary genius, and one I never doubted.

Arcane is a very entertaining story. In this book, we are introduced to a world filled with adventure and friendships. Sever Bronny has opened this world to all with his “The Arinthian Line” trilogy. Many thanks to Mr. Bronny for creating and sharing this tale.

i love this book so much! can't wait for honors price to come out, easily my second favorite series first being inheritance and thats coming from a person who gets bad grades because i read this kind of stuff for my own good. must read!

This is the story of the "coming of age" of a young man that totally captivated me. He personifies what is good even though he has his flaws and lets you see how his real though processes play through but can still do the right thing.

If you have prime you should at least take a stab at this book. One free book read and I was hooked. Just finished burdens edge,which follows the first 5 and begins a new trilogy. You might be able to predict the outcome but the author has a great way of making the path completely different that what you would expect. This book is all about the journey.

This is a solid coming of age story about a young orphan boy who eventually finds family and begins to learn magic. The writing and editing are good; I have no qualms there. And the author is capable of good description and scene writing. The book flows.

Why did I give it three stars? There are several highly improbable moments in the book. Specifically ******(SPOILER ALERT)****** the MC was an orphan who was found dying by the roadside by a knight, who takes him in and trains him as his squire. After this knight dies in an invasion, the boy stumbles into the wilderness, only to be found by his grandmother, who was living in a cave on the side of a nearby mountain. His grandmother also happens to be pretty much the most powerful magic user in the world. And the villain of the story, the evil king, is the MC's father.

Also, magic is ridiculously easy to learn and use in this world. Basically, within days of the MC starting to learn magic, he already knows several spells. So, it isn't so much the quality of the writing itself which made me give this book three stars, rather, it was the larger plot and character decisions.

I really enjoyed it and love the 'magic' of it and the twists and surprises. It has humor and is so well described that it was easy to imagine in my mind. I have just begun the second book and it is going to be a good read too!

Just right for a coming of age tale of heroes and bad guys...it pressed the right buttons for my escapist habit.
I always seem to write somewhere in these reviews to ignore poor reviews and judge for yourself, there's a lot of people who give poor reviews because the story just wasn't their "thing"...i can't tell you how many books i've enjoyed that had bad reviews! You'll never know what you're missing until you read it for yourself!
This one, this story, was well done and no poor reviews here...just read it!

I have just finished reading the series and I am truly impressed with this author. You can tell he put significant effort in creating his world and characters. I truly never knew what was coming next, even by looking at the table of contents. I look forward to his next series because I think I will often think of characters, which very few books have stayed with me so strongly.

I really enjoyed this book! It was exciting and full of action, adventure, thrills, good versus overwhelming evil, deception and betrayal. I am looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

I received an ecopy of this book from the author for an honest review. The opinions are all mine.

The book was written for a younger audience, so keep that in mind while reading the book. It does not bring a new concept to the fantasy genre nor break any new ground in story telling, but it is a light read. It's perfect for reading between books that may be more difficult reads. I will recommend it to anyone who needs an easy read to balance the heaviness of other books.

This is one of the greatest books I have ever read. It is full of adventure, action, and is very well written. Arcane is definitely worth Reading and will put u on the edge of your seat ready to start the next. As you advance into the series, you will learn to love the characters and will be so grateful that the books increase In length.

This was an exciting adventure, a battle between good and evil. The young characters act their age, the "good" have flaws, and the "bad" are terrible and disgusting. Darkness and death are relieved by childish curiosity and adventure. It was a good introduction to the series.

Fabulous book for those who like fantasy adventure. Read all 5 books and the first of his sequel trilogy in under a month. One of the first series that I actually turn off the TV to start reading early instead of just reading for a couple minutes before bed. Well crafted story line and characters make me ready to read the next book. Waiting for the rest of the sequel trilogy to be finished.

Very much enjoyed this series. Moves quickly, enjoyable characters, just an all around good read. Once I started I couldn't stop, read the series in about 2 weeks. Now I have to patiently wait for the next book of the next series! Very much looking forward to it.

This book immediately sucks you in on an action packed ride. Augum(mc) is a gentle soul with fierce courage, beaten, ridiculed and starved. He finds his magic when all hope seems lost. He finds friends, family, and a mentor. This story is frought with danger, and adversity that binds the heroes together..grandma is pretty rocking too. Wonderful read and I can't wait for more.

Interesting story, with some twists and turns I didn't necessarily see coming. Also does a good job of displaying some of the confusing romantic aspects of puberty. I look forward to reading more of the Arinthian Line books.

I rarely write a review, tho I should, but here I so truly owe a debt to the author that I must; I read all 5, loved the characters, and especially found the action highly imaginative, developed with thought, and tense; greatly entertaining, thanks!

This trio of books provide a wonderful reading experience that can be shared with youngsters and adults alike. There is a rich blend of architecture, plot and character development providing hours of entertainment

I don't understand all the five star reviews.

I understand this series definitely intended for teens as the primary audience. Its just not that great in terms of writing. For example, the main characters entire families are slaughtered but they will be laughing and joking around within a few hours as if nothing happened. Bare minimum of backstory on most of the characters. The plot careens from the implausible to the improbable with no break and little in the way of transition.

The book would have benefitted from the author spending a little more time building the world rather than rushing from one scene to the next.

Great read! Had me glued from start to finish, even giving up sleep to continue reading. I can't wait to see what happens in the next book and if Augum or one of the girls learn to chronocast or simulcast. :)

I find the overall character of the main characters childish and inadequate for a time period similar to the dark ages. There's lack of concentration and seriousness in regards to sorcery is not realistic with the motivation someone would actually feel from losing all of one's loved ones. Therefore I could bot bring myself to continue reading the book as the magic system is brilliantly displayed while the characters lack proper display of emotions in regards to their situations.

I wish I could rate this higher but there are some serious issues that only get worse as the series moves on .. the biggest one being the three main Chars are spoiled, whiny, unrealistic, dim-witted, lazy and never grow up ... there is just no progression with their personalities no matter what trials they face, they are cynical, rude in the way they assess and speak to people, crass in a lot of instances, they bring most of their trouble on themselves by not showing even the slightest respect for anyone, including each other, and that combined with an absolutely crazy habit of making the same mistakes over and over again by trusting people they shouldn't while looking down on or being rude to those they should be nicer to... the author drones on about how they realized this or that, supposedly showing the stages of maturing, but he gets repetative and way too wordy with how often they sink into these mood swings (or whatever they are) only to have the chars fall back into the same behavior as before... not once changing anything over the couse of 6 books...

...these are supposed to be heroes of the realm with an almost unrealistic drive to be perfect .. standing up for good and right despite the consequences while not allowing themselves to be normal teenagers... this is a hit and miss concept, the author just fails to hit it every time .. he pushes the ideals they should be meeting and drones on about responsibility and fairness and tries to make you feel bad about how hard the trio is on themselves and yet they DESERVE to be blamed for most of the harsh ideas they have of themselves.. 1. they are critical of everyone EXCEPT the bad guys, showing far too much compassion to their enemies or outright jerks ...but they mostly ignore or contribute to the bad behavior of the ppl around them, including that of members of their own inner group... Leera is snide and rude and selfish, she doesnt care if her behavior hurts the man she loves or effects the group, she is just rude and always thinks of herself and her needs before anyone else and then they all just let it slide and the author swings it as 'adorable' to her closest friends no matter that her behavior is off the charts catty, petty, mean and rude .. and she doesn't change through ANY of the books causing no end of trouble for the trio, she is just a major B**** with no redeeming qualities .. Bridget is boring .. her char flat although of the three she is the one most like what the author is trying to make them out to be .. though when it comes to being nice she is pathetically ignorant, even at the cost of exposing her friends to bad people ... and again, she never changes .. Augum is lazy and omg soo ignorant... whining about how much responsibility he has and yet he never actually takes on those responsibilities taking every chance he can to be lazy, 'suck face' with leera or sink into his own personal brand of depression, castigating himself constantly and yet never making an actual effort to do anything about it .. making bad choices is his only real skill except when the author needs him to step up and, completly out of charachter, be the hero that he is supposed to be in the book before slumping back into this depressing and pathetic state .. I actually found myself skipping over the dialog and innapropriate 'banter' to get back to the parts of the story that were good .. but then the author STILL kept failing to nail the story or think through the story to make them seem even reasonably intelligent .. Why isn't fentwick gaurding the door instead of ordinaries? why don't they use him to practice? why is the trio slacking on learning but then the author makes it sound like they are dedicated to fulfilling their promise, why won't they do ANYTHING about the sad financial burdens, why let the bad guys get one over on them every single time? why wasn't their mentor doing anything to actually mentor them instead of being the worst rudest crudest mentor in living history? Why do the adults always seem to think they can get through it all on their own without one iota of actual help and then accuse them of doing everything wrong .. its a world of idiots with the bad guys the only ones who seem to be clever on anything and yet, somehow, the trio always comes in and kicks butt when they have to, showing no real abilities between those times?

writing style.. there is a confusing mix of modern slang mixed into ancient (even shakesperian) times .. it pulls you out of immersion every time because it doesnt fit .. and then for some reason they go from excessive modern slang (including a lot of stuff that shouldnt even be considered in this time frame) only to fall back to them going from medieval speech, to thees and thous and modern IN THE SAME SENTENCE... then half the big words need a dictionary they dont mean what the author intended them to mean .. and the dialog on this is absurd .. almost insulting the reader by how dumb the trio acts in explaining every concept ad nauseam making them seem even more inept and lazy .. and 'suck face', slogging, meaning glances that are impossible to convey what they are supposed to convey with no real or mature behavior or coversations .. its a BIG mess .. the sad part is this is all mixed in with a good story which is the ONLY reason I gave it a three... but if the intent of the author was to make us LIKE the trio then it failed utterly in its intent .. at this point I wouldnt care if they all got killed and another trio rose up to take their place .. especially leera and jez the mentor .. they are completly unlikeable...

I found Arcane to be a simple but enjoyable read, a well-written and fun story. The characters were classically engaging and the lands & magics were creative and exciting. This is definitely a book I would recommend to anyone looking for a good read that leaves you wanting more in the simple, fun way.

This book caught my attention right away i always love a good wizard book and coming of age book this one right here is both of those I've read many wizard books and this is one of the best that i have read

I hadn't picked up a fantasy series in awhile. I had surgery and this popped up as a recommendation. Loved it quickly. It's the first book so builds character and plot but intrigue pulls you into the action.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys good fantasy. It does start out on the slow side but soon you will find yourselves tripping over action scene after action scene. Can't wait for the next installment...

The first book in a series is designed to set the plot and introduce the players. This book accomplished this in spades. The characters are interesting and well formed. I fully recommend this book.

Surprising good debut novel. A very fast paced novel that leans on both the Robert Jordan and hero's journey styles quite well. The first few chapters have some cringe worthy moments, but they're very fast paced. A few chapters later you find the reason behind things and you realize all the time you were cringing it wasn't actually horribly cliche writing, it was by design.

While nothing stunning, Arcane was an entertaining story that kept me returning to it. The characters were easy to fro attached to, and while there was a relative lack of suspense, just watching the narrative unfold was rewarding. The take on magic was original in its own right, something that is refreshing in a genre full of repeated tropes.

I would definitely recommend this for a light and enjoyable read, but don't go into it expecting anything particularly deep.

Loved it. I'm not young...I'm 67, but this book caught me up and I thoroughly enjoyed following our young hero Augum around his very believable world. Looking forward to cracking on with the next one.

I have no idea how this has almost 5 stars. The main characters (supposedly 14) act as if they are 10. The characters act like they have the closest relationships after a few hours of knowing each other and learn supposedly difficult things easily or with difficulty without any discernible reason for the difference. It's just difficult to take seriously in general.

Wow, I don't understand how this is an the store Best Seller. It has so many grammatical errors and tense oddities, and the prose does not flow at all. Here's an example: "Augum picked up a bucket and splashed the stallion. Its coarse chestnut hair gleamed in the afternoon sun as water dripped to the arid dirt."

First of all, water does not drip "to" dirt. How about "into"? And "splashed the stallion"? All you had to do was append the sense with "with water" and it would sound 10x better. This is incidentally the first paragraph of the book. If you can't clean up your first paragraph, do do you expect me to invest hours and hours reading your book?

Avoid this book.

Story is nicely crafted. Writing is a little on the plain side - there isn't a lot of picture painting going on here, but the mythos and the story itself are reasonable well crafted and enjoyable even if it does fall into a certain amount of cliche.

Within just the first chapter, the author has already hit an amazing range of trite YA fantasy cliches. Subsequent chapters only build on this base of pure imitation. Add to that some of the most leaden, error-plagued prose I've seen in this genre (and that's saying something!), and you have an impressively bad novel. I hope most of the 5-star reviews were paid spam, because I'd hate to think anyone actually read this and thought it was good.

Good storytelling. Diverse and interesting characters which relate well to ones I've most liked and detested in my own life. A smoothly developed story line that nicely hooks you for the sequel. Good stuff.

I didn't like that oxy was the authors choice for a cure for a Hellhound bite. The book also sounded anti-Christian to me, I did not like that. I wish I had not bought it for my 13 year old grandson. I will not encourage him to read it!

FIRST I will say what I disliked. Augum,Lea,bird.. the three main characters were not the greatest and I feel the whole time they were not progressing. Now, I understand the development process but they didn't know one offensive spell whatsoever. How we're they able to protect themselves an by reading the book you learn they got by on just been "written" to be by and it was out of the blue methods of that all through the book. Now after three spells they get a degree and no offensive spells lol... but enough of that. So what like about the book is Mrs. Stone she save the book a early dismissal from me an earned it 3 stars instead of 2.