Spellslinger by Sebastien de CastellMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
After several years of seeing the name of Sebastien de Castell on fantasy shelves, it finally took Brett Michael Orr reading this book to get me started doing the same. And when I read this, I immediately wondered, why the heck does my bookstore shelve this in the adult fantasy section instead of YA where it pretty clearly belongs? I mean, it's like the second coming of Codex Alera, centered on a teenage boy with a certain inability to properly perform magic, but this time even more in his head due to a super welcome first-person POV...but I digress.
de Castell gives us a super unique fantasy world borrowing influences from not only the American West, but also from Ancient Egypt - a strange combination, but it works pretty well. Though I'll be honest, the single best character in this book, to me, was Ferius Parfax, the (often literally) smoking hot redhead fantasy-Texan who shows our boy Kellen how to try doing some magic according to customs he's not used to. Metaphor for sexual awakening from a repressive culture? Maybe that's why I super relate to Kellen...and why I love Ferius so much. That, plus I'm pretty sure Uncle Abydos gets his name as a Stargate reference at the very least, which means my buddy Koda's gonna love this book too! Hell, I'm tempted to send him a copy for Christmas or something. Luckily, I've already got Book 2 ordered and waiting for me to read, and I've ordered the third today as well. Stay tuned!
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