David Stewart Stories: Review

The following is two reviews:

Crown of Sight: Review

I just finished reading Crown of Sight, by the Youtuber and author David Stewart. David Stewart is a Youtube author that I have been subscribed to for some time. Of course, like every content creator I watch, I don't agree with everything he says, but I enjoy listening to what he has to say. As such, I figured that I would try reading some of his books. This started with his book, Eyes in the Walls, mainly because he started posting the audio of the book on his channel. But he still has one more chapter to that book to post before I finish that one (as of writing this), and so even as I picked this one up later on, I've finished it first.

Overall, my reaction to this book is fairly negative. Let me be clear, however, I don't necessarily think this is because of David Stewart as a writer: I'll spoil you for my Eyes in the Walls review by saying that I have enjoyed that one so far. This book, however, was harder to get into.

Summary (No spoilers)

This is a very short book, perhaps a novelette, that details the events of a siege. The defenders are Elves and the attackers are humans and/or giants led by a conqueror.

Analysis (Spoilers)

The first thing I want to talk about is the book's length and how this interacted with other factors. This was the crux of the many issues, I thought were keeping me from liking the story. Clearly, this was Stewart's deliberate choice, so this is a preference. (In fact, all my criticisms are a preference, but this one is more obvious because it is less universally accepted). The length of the book, on its own, is not something that even I think is inherently bad, I just think that because of the nature of the story, with its cast of characters and the plot that is unfolding, the story should have had more time to develop. I found it hard to get interested in any of the characters. I didn't really like or care for them, and I'll have to admit that I found this book very hard to come back to and finish. The characters of a story are one of the biggest things for me, and without that, there is nothing to grab me.

Another thing that is tied to the length is the magic system. The magic is confusing and unexplained. Of course, this could also be intentional. Stewart is probably going for a softer magic system, at least within the context of this story. But . . . the way that the magic is used is in a way that is unsatisfying. I was confused by the revelation of the book rewriting the past. I don't really know how much was changed, or what was happening, or even if the plot of the story actually happened. I am just so confused.

This leads me to the ending of the book. I really did not care for how the story ended, with the very magical artifact being hunted ultimately doing away with the villain of the story. The story climaxes with that twist, where the man's magic breaks and the Crown rejects him, but all of this feels like it came out of nowhere and was completely anti-climactic. Tied to this, is the magic system, which I don't understand. Soft magic systems become a problem when you resolve plots with them because it often feels like an ass-pull, and this story was no exception.

There is an interesting parallel to Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. I remember that one episode of Big Bang Theory, where it was pointed out that Indiana had no effect on the plot of the story. If he had not existed, the Nazis would get their hands on the Ark, open it and die. So, it goes for Katach.

Finally, I didn't like the prose. The prose was not exceptionally poor, I just thought the descriptions could be more creative. Maybe some of this has to do with the condensed writing associated with writing a shorter story. Either way, I was not grabbed by it.

Conclusion

Overall, I did not care for the book. I'll give it about a 2/10.

Eyes in the Walls: Review

I just finished the Eyes in the Walls audiobook by David Stewart. Overall, I did like this book, as I mentioned in the last review.

Summary (No spoilers)

A young boy named Billy witnesses a strange figure in his mother's funeral home. After that moment, this figure begins to appear in the boy's dreams, haunting him and threatening to kill him. He is diagnosed with schizophrenia by the adults in his life who do not believe that what he is seeing is real.

Strides (Spoilers)

The first thing I want to talk about is the length of the book. I mentioned in my review of the last book that I did not like the length of that book. This book is around the same length, yet I enjoyed it. This is because of the content of the book. There is only one perspective character in this story, and the setting and the scenario is much simpler; as such, the length of the story works much better. And, overall, I thought the story worked very well at the length it was. The only reason I would demand there be more story would be to flesh out the character relationships, but that isn't even a necessity.

The second thing that comes to mind are the different ideas discussed within the story. I really enjoyed the fact that this story touches on the religion, specifically Christianity. The story does not necessarily take sides on the issue but uses it as a relevant variable in the life of the main character. The story also touches upon mental illness and how it can tie into idea of hauntings. I am not well read enough to know how meaningful my perspective is to other people, but I can say that I had not seen a horror like this before. It was new to me, so that alone was good enough.

The third thing that comes to mind is the ending. I liked how the plot resolves. The twist is basically that the supernatural occurrences are explained by two independent natural phenomena. These unparsimonious explanations, while usually epistemologically ill-founded, always make for good plot twists precisely because these explanations are less likely to be true and, therefore, assumed. I generally don't have a preference one way or another for stories that have actual supernatural events or those that have those events explained away, so I when I say that I liked this ending, it has nothing to do with that. I just thought it was in interesting and unexpected way to develop the story that made it enjoyable.

I cannot comment on the prose in any way, due to the fact that the story is an audiobook. There were no notable flaws in my listening, nor any standout descriptions; I just know that listening to it means that I am paying less attention to how the story is written on a line-by-line level.

Conclusion

There aren't any complaints that come to mind.

Overall, I liked the book, and so I will give it an 8/10.