*BookBear Presents* Gol by J.W. Webb

Welcome back! I'm excited to be working with BookBear again on the month long book tour for Gol by J.W. Webb. As you may know by now, I love supporting independent authors and hope that you will choose to support them too!

  

 

Synopsis:

Gol. A continent on the brink of destruction. Once a mighty kingdom, now six provinces torn apart by treacherous barons.
In one province two young lovers strive to stay together when all else prises them apart. Lissane and
Erun must survive to guide their people through the coming storm. The odds are stacked against
them. Erun, dreamer and fool, is chosen for a dark path. Whilst Lissane is given away by her father
the baron to wed the brutal son of a rival ruler.
Meanwhile, at the far side of the world a sorcerer has freed the fire demon, Ashmali, setting off a
chain of events that could ultimately bring about Gol's long foretold ruin. Caught between rising
seas, civil war, and approaching fire the continent’s time is fast running out.
Gol features beautiful sketches and maps by Tolkien illustrator, Roger Garland. It opens the doors on a new epic fantasy series titled Legends of Ansu. Within its content lies an sweeping tale of love, hatred, vengeance and destruction. In Gol the high courage of a few individuals is all that stands against the will of fickle gods and treachery of men. 

J.W. Webb - find out more at Legendsofansu.com

My Review:

I went into reading this story completely blind. I didn't read the blurb first, as is my preference. So I didn't know anything about it beforehand. I was pleasantly surprised by this story. I found it interesting from the beginning. The story often switches perspective, and often in the middle of the chapter and often a few times. Webb mostly accomplished this seamlessly. There were a few rough transitions, but for the most part they were done well. None of the transitions caused me any confusion, whether rough or smooth. I was actually very impressed with the way the transitions of perspective were done when it was switching from one to another without the obvious breaks in the text that denoted a switch in character and scene.

I found the story itself to be interesting. The way it is written reminds me a lot of the Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin, but less brutal and about 95% less incest. That's not to say there isn't adult content in Gol. There are torture scenes, sexual scenes, and other violent deaths.

I also really enjoyed the characters. It was rough going in the begging of the story for me to care and like the characters, but that did come and it didn't take too long either. For me, it came with a scene involving on of the main characters, Erun and the brothers of the girl that he loves. Even though this scene happens not too long into the beginning, I don't want to include any detail on it. It's an event that triggers the growth and journey of Erun, and I wouldn't want to spoil anything! This was the turning point for not just Erun, but other characters as well.

The story seems to flow really well, with a few rough patches here or there. I was glad to have read this on my Kindle because I found myself using the dictionary quite a bit because there were many words used that I was not familiar with. This use of obscure words (at least for me) hardly ever took away from the story. Only a few times did I look up a word and wonder why it was necessary to use that word instead of another. That being said, I do have an appreciation for the way words were used in Gol. The writing style has the feel of fantasy. Does that make sense? I don't really know how else to describe it. There are also some beautiful drawings that are in the novel right at the beginning of each book, as well as two maps in the beginning.

An example of the drawings

Gol was really enjoyable and it gets better and better as you go. It has some hiccups, as most books do. I gave Gol 4 out of 5 stars.

Go read it! :)

Until next time,

Jenell