Raeden Zen's Blog, page 480
November 5, 2012
November 4, 2012
November 3, 2012
Vivetal (4-Star) Review
Setting the Stage for the Reassortment Series, October 27, 2012
Raeden Zen has his own style that is unique among writers in the sci-fi fantasy fiction realm. In the elements he has presented before this new book he demonstrated facility in making visual objects and situations that would challenge even the finest scene setters. That seems to be his intention right now - to prepare a cadre of readers who are willing to forego reality and even relinquish the norm in sci-fi writing and sail along with him in his malleable world of challenging make believe and cue into the stage décor that likely he will further develop with the subsequent books in this series.
VIVETAL is brief but densely packed with information that takes concentration on the reader’s part to incorporate into the mindset required to follow his characters and their various transmutations in both appearance, and in time warps. Zen’s expertise is in description of strange coatings on his main character Aleron with a substance called vivetal (an ingeniously crafted idea that should find excellent use as the story moves one. The struggle between Ale (Aleron) and the metallic assassin is at least as well written as the storyboard ideas for the current sci-fi films. And Zen has explored enough scientific information to make his invented concepts credible - very strange, but credible.
Where this novella falls short is in character development: both Ale and Oriana (his connection to the other side of time and space) are sketchy and by the end of this `beginning’ we still have little idea of how they look or what they think and how they got to where they are, another way of say they have not been developed adequately to remember them as well as we remember the stage props. But seeing Raeden Zen’s growth as a writer it is likely that there is purpose to that `flaw’ - we probably will see the human side of these and other characters as they enter stage right and stage left and advance to the proscenium arch. For now, this is convincing, hallucinogenic, dazzling and engrossing evidence that we will be captive readers to an ongoing saga.
Grady Harp, October 12
