Friday, May 8, 2020

Book Review: Fire Bringer by David Clement-Davies


Amazon.com: Fire Bringer (9780142408735): David Clement-Davies: Books

Fire Bringer by David Clement-Davies is an epic fantasy deer tale that draws some obvious inspiration from Watership Down. But is it any good? Well, let’s see, shall we? Spoilers ahead.

This book follows the titular protagonist known as Rannoch, a red deer born with a mark in the shape of an oaken leaf on his brow, which marks him as a legend according to an ancient prophecy. He’s supposedly the one to bring down the evil deer lord Sgorr who is set on taking over all of Scotia and subject the other deer to his will. Rannoch and his friends flee the evil of the deer lord early on, embarking on a dangerous journey of self-discovery, before eventually returning to make the one-eyed deer pay for his actions.

As far as xenofictions go, I’d say this is a pretty solid one. Not the greatest one out there, but it definitely has all the good stuff. Lore, a chosen one, a classic good vs evil plot, a deliciously depraved villain, and more. Is it the most original execution out there? I’d say no, it’s clear that this book was inspired by Watership Down. We’ve got the same things going on, with realistic animal behavior being explained in a different way, the deer having unique words for things and there being a god and a legendary trickster and the ending where the main character dies.

But I don’t feel like that limits Fire Bringer in the slightest. Its inspiration is obvious, but the execution is overall good and unique enough to set it apart. Heck, I even prefer this one over Watership Down.

Why is that? First things first: the characters. Rannoch is… not the most interesting protagonist you’ll ever come across. He’s very morally good, but he’s also quite proud at times, and at one point becomes dangerously pacifistic. So he’s pretty decent if you ask me. His friends are all pretty engaging characters with their own smaller arcs, most of them, anyways. The villains are definitely a bit on the flat side, though. Sgorr is very obviously evil and while it’s fun at some points to see how dark he can get, I also feel like he lacks a bit. We’re giving some backstory on him, but it’s only through exposition. It would’ve been cool if we’d gotten a prologue or chapter from his point of view or something where we fully explored his motives. Right now he kinda seems like “evil for the sake of being evil” with some throwaway lines of dialogue explaining briefly why he is like that. Funny, because I actually made this exact same commentary on the villain of Watership Down.

With this being a dark xenofiction, know what you’re getting into. Deer and other animals do die, sometimes in horrible ways. Things get pretty bloody and there’s more characters that die than I can count.

Something this book actually has over Watership Down is that there are more strong female characters and they do have unique personalities and character arcs. That’s a point to Fire Bringer if you ask me.

Some things I did notice that slightly irked me while reading, though: first of all, there are too many named characters. Even the ones that just appear for like two sentences of dialogue for a brief appearance get named. Since the core named cast is already a lot to keep up with, I really wouldn’t have gone down this route, because now you’re just throwing even more names into the mix.

Secondly, there is too much name-repeating in sentences. Characters will be like “How are you, Rannoch.” And then the other will be like “I am fine, Willow. How are you?” and then this’ll continue and they’ll keep name-dropping each other every few sentences or other. That’s just very repetitive to read.

If you want a very original execution of the prophecy good vs evil story and/or are not okay with Clement-Davies drawing some obvious inspiration of Watership Down, I wouldn’t recommend it. But if you want a story that hits familiar beats in a good way, has some interesting lore and characters, and takes you on an epic journey across ancient Great Britain, I’d definitely say check it out!

Rating: 4/5


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