Book Review: Ariel by Steven R. Boyett
Jul. 5th, 2014 12:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
juushikaTitle: Ariel (Change Book 1)
Author: Steven R. Boyett
Published: New York: Open Road Integrated Media, 2014 (1983)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 435
Total Page Count: 146,799
Text Number: 432
Read Because: interest in the companion animal trope, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: A young man and his Familiar, a unicorn, are interrupted in their journeys across post-apocalyptic America by a necromancer who has his sights set on Ariel's horn. With a unicorn and magical apocalypse, Ariel is an interesting book in part and in theory; the world has potential, and the companion animal trope is particularly id-driven and surprisingly explicit as an examination purity and intimacy. But Boyett caves to the perceived need for an antagonist/conflict/climax, and while the grittiness that adds to the world is useful context for the boy/unicorn bond, it also comes to overshadow it. I wish Ariel were a different book, one with a less ambitious plot and more willingness to linger on the bittersweet ending. The book it is instead is readable but loses its way, but I don't particularly recommend it.
Author: Steven R. Boyett
Published: New York: Open Road Integrated Media, 2014 (1983)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 435
Total Page Count: 146,799
Text Number: 432
Read Because: interest in the companion animal trope, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: A young man and his Familiar, a unicorn, are interrupted in their journeys across post-apocalyptic America by a necromancer who has his sights set on Ariel's horn. With a unicorn and magical apocalypse, Ariel is an interesting book in part and in theory; the world has potential, and the companion animal trope is particularly id-driven and surprisingly explicit as an examination purity and intimacy. But Boyett caves to the perceived need for an antagonist/conflict/climax, and while the grittiness that adds to the world is useful context for the boy/unicorn bond, it also comes to overshadow it. I wish Ariel were a different book, one with a less ambitious plot and more willingness to linger on the bittersweet ending. The book it is instead is readable but loses its way, but I don't particularly recommend it.
