Review: Black Feathers by Joseph D'Lacey

Publisher: Angry Robot
Series: Black Dawn #1

Pages: 393

Received: Received a copy from Angry Robot Publishers in exchange for an honest review

Release Date: March 28, 2013
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Goodreads Synopsis:

Black Feathers is a modern fantasy set in two epochs: the Black Dawn, a time of environmental apocalypse, and generations into the future in its aftermath, the Bright Day.

In each era, a child undertakes a perilous journey to find a dark messiah known as The Crowman. In their hands lies the fate of the planet as they attempt to discover whether The Crowman is our saviour… or the final incarnation of evil.

My Review:

I will start out this review by saying this book is an adult book, and definitely has some disturbing scenes in it. This book had a really intriguing premise to me, a modern fantasy set in two different times and following two different characters, both of whom have a journey they must take to save the world. The Crowman is the character that will save them all, but you never truly meet him in this book, there are many stories about him and no one truly knows what he is like. This is the first book and it definitely feels like that, D'Lacey takes his time in this book, setting up the world and the characters that readers will follow.

I found myself very confused in the beginning, there is a lot of back and forth between the two different times, but there was no indication of where in time I was reading, so I didn't know which child was in Black Dawn and which was in Bright Day. I did eventually begin to figure out where in time I was... (you really have to pay close attention to details to figure this out). This book takes it's time to get into a steady rhythm, and even then I found that it was slow going. This book is about getting to know the characters and what the world is like for each of them.

There were many times throughout my reading of this book that I was close to putting it down, there were quite a few scenes that disturbed me, and it would get worse in certain places. Though I wanted to put it down I couldn't, these disturbing scenes did add to the book and really helped the development of one of the characters by the end of everything. What really stuck out to me in this book was how D'Lacey gives readers the idea of what people can really turn to in times of need. The violence to keep themselves alive, looting to get whatever they can and hoarding things to keep longer. It is in simple terms a book about survival during the worst of times.

Though I was interested in things about this book, I just found that it couldn't really keep my attention. When my attention was grabbed at certain parts I wanted to put it down again within the next few pages because I couldn't handle what was happening. D'Lacey really knows how to give his readers chills and can really imagine a dark and twisted world, but for me, sadly, this book was not my cup of tea. I can definitely see readers enjoying it, I just found that it took too long to get into things (but it was great world-building). I do hope the second book answers many of the questions left behind after this book. I'm just not sure if it will be my thing.