Ser Ghostwriter

Joshua Derrick (Goodreads Author)

4.86 · Rating details · 7 ratings · 6 reviews

Heraclia is a land of poets, whose haikus and sonnets build towers, grow grain, and sail ships. Ed is a scribe to one of these poets, and when his master is murdered by highwaymen, he takes up his quill and becomes a ghostwriter, a masterless poet. Broad-shouldered and strong, Ed does not exactly have the makings of a master poet, but enters his names into the rolls at a p ...more

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Kindle Edition, 157 pages

Published December 18th 2021

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· 7 ratings · 6 reviews

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Feb 05, 2022 Ron Sami rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fantasy

This is fantasy with interesting ideas in the field of poetry.

Plot. Rating 4
The book has one storyline, but it is branched enough for a small number of pages. I liked how dangerous the art of poetry can be in this world, and how difficult it is for poets to improvise and find the right words. This is shown well and realistically, in my opinion. Political intrigues, personal likes and dislikes, as well as personality traits of the hero introduce unexpected twists into the progressive development This is fantasy with interesting ideas in the field of poetry.

Plot. Rating 4
The book has one storyline, but it is branched enough for a small number of pages. I liked how dangerous the art of poetry can be in this world, and how difficult it is for poets to improvise and find the right words. This is shown well and realistically, in my opinion. Political intrigues, personal likes and dislikes, as well as personality traits of the hero introduce unexpected twists into the progressive development of the plot.

Characters. Rating 4
The main character of the book is well portrayed. His lack of confidence in his skills is clearly visible on the pages of the book. In his adventures, he bravely overcomes various temptations and remains true to the poetic tradition. It's good that he thinks about his teacher quite a lot, and it seemed to me that their joint wanderings influenced his upbringing based on the way he is shown in the book.
Some of the secondary characters are well developed for such a short book. Kip and his mother, Elizabeth, and her father, Hercopius, have personalities of their own. Other male characters that Ed met somewhat merge together; perhaps they lacked more expressive external features and a focused assessment of their personalities and actions on behalf of the protagonist.

Dialogues. Rating 5
I enjoyed the dialogues in the book. Many of them are written with good humor, such as those in the second chapter, and during the first competitions.

Writing style. Rating 5
The style of the book contains good specific descriptions, beautiful comparisons, and accurate descriptions of actions. The descriptions often deepen and clarify some concepts in the book without leaving them static, which corresponds to real life.

Worldbuilding. Rating 5
The peculiarity of this world, which is described in the annotation, makes it bizarre. The book has detailed worldbuilding from both the areas of religion, history, and old legends, and from the side of various small details of the Middle Ages. There is also a lot of thinking about poetry and how to create it. Various poems seemed interesting to me; although, I am not experienced in poetry. The names of many heroes are consistent with earthly poets, but I did not catch what this was done for, because I am not very familiar with their biographies and poetry.

Conclusion. Overall rating 5
This is an excellent book with an original idea that will be of interest to fantasy lovers, especially those who are versed in poetry. ...more

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Mar 01, 2022 Iseult Murphy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Imaginative, original fantasy.

What an inventive, fun, exciting book!
Set in a world where words have power - actual magical power, so that poems can hurt or heal when spoken by someone with training - poets (or Po) are people of much importance and hold tournaments (or slams) where they joust with words.
I loved the idea of poems playing such an important part in this world. While I chuckled at the references to real poems and poets, the author has taken the idea and developed it into a three di ...more

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Apr 01, 2022 K.E. rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Poetry on another level

The whole premise of this book was really cool. Poetry used as a magic form isn't something I read a lot in books. I liked seeing all the familiar poets woven into the story in such an imaginative way. I also got the sense that the author had a thing against Robert Frost. There were several good lines I highlighted that stood out to me. At times it was hard to keep track of all the different people and the titles, like the differences between the pos and the muses. Some of ...more

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Apr 12, 2022 Jamie Cruise rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Subtly Brilliant: a diamond in the rough

Ser Ghostwriter is a short but wonderful read. It is quietly brilliant, quick in pace, the poetry within the prose elegant and in some places quite moving.

Ser Ghostwriter has all of the trimmings of an Arthurian tale or a chapter of Don Quixote, yet is completely accessible to the green or casual reader. Derrick has created a world and mythology from our own history of poets and their craft, and it was deeply satisfying to recognise references to poets lik Subtly Brilliant: a diamond in the rough

Ser Ghostwriter is a short but wonderful read. It is quietly brilliant, quick in pace, the poetry within the prose elegant and in some places quite moving.

Ser Ghostwriter has all of the trimmings of an Arthurian tale or a chapter of Don Quixote, yet is completely accessible to the green or casual reader. Derrick has created a world and mythology from our own history of poets and their craft, and it was deeply satisfying to recognise references to poets like Keats or Plath - even the odes and cameos that eluded me felt authentic and informed.

As mentioned before, the poetry, even in instances when it is intentionally presented as 'not the best' is quite striking, as if the lines and rhymes were themselves authentic sub-creations of Derrick's characters. A personal favourite that stuck with me was the 'vilanelle for valour' (I burried a man in the rain / Who will carry his refrain?). I have perhaps a rudimentary (being generous) knowledge of the poetic arts or particular liking of poetry at all, but these little limericks, haikus and a deadly little sonnet felt quietly brilliant; clear, clever, and modest.

I must admit I have been a little generous in giving Ser Ghostwriter 5 stars. I called this book 'a diamond in the rough' as I feel that it sums up my feelings best. While I admire the fantastic concept and accessibility of the story, the formatting (at least of the ebook) and editing need some attention. While a misspelling or missing quotation mark here or there can be forgiven, some words seem to be missing in places: actions or dialogue attributed a little too vaguely to follow, resulting in small jumps in the prose that are jarring.

This said, I do feel that if this book was given a proper edit it would be a fantastic piece of work. I have been reading more indie works over the last year and rarely feel moved to consider a sequel (in some cases I resent coming to the end of a book and finding there is nothing but a cliffhanger, discovering what I had did not even conclude a complete arc, let alone a story). However, I very much liked where this story ended and approached the end quietly hoping there might be more, similarly sized installments in the future. I can certainly see a collection of tales about Po Edgar in volumes having wide appeal - though I would hope that Derrick might find a good editor to work with to truly make the best of these stories.

...more

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