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The Heart of Myrial (Shadowleague)
by Maggie Furey
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Orbit (2000-07-06)
ISBN: 1857239717
EAN: 9781857239713
Dewy Decimal #: 813
Paperback: 512 pages
Edition: New edition
SKU: B447-1001
Condition: New
Comments: In stock - Immediate despatch from an efficient and professional leading British bookselling firm.
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Editorial Reviews
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Amazon.co.uk Review
This fast-moving adventure opens Maggie Furey's second fantasy sequence, "The Shadowleague"; her first was the "Artefacts of Power" tetralogy, published 1994-7. The Heart of Myrial is set in a particularly artificial-seeming fantasyland which proves to be not a world but a technomagical construct, divided into isolated regions by sorcerous barriers of force. Thanks to the machinations of a bad guy who may have good motives, these "curtain walls" are now failing--the first symptoms being clashes between the enclaves' different environments, leading to prolonged descriptions of truly lousy weather. In theory the barriers are guarded by and can be penetrated only by Loremasters of the Shadowleague, a secret inner circle of representatives from this patchwork world's various species: humans, dragons, centaurs, wind-sprites, insectile aliens and more. In practice the Shadowleague is almost impotent. Against this complex background, various characters struggle across the landscape through terrible weather. A woman Loremaster and her irrepressibly feisty firedrake companion play leading parts in the large cast (many of whom suffer death or worse). After tortuous regroupings and plot twists centred on a particular city that houses a key magical shrine, book 1 concludes with a gory invasion of nasties through the holed curtain wall. It reads well enough, and of course there's more to come. -- David Langford
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Customer Reviews
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can't wait for the follow-on
Rating  (4)
Date: 2006-06-13
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I loved The Heart of Myrial' and have just finished it! I feel empty now that I cannot continue the story, however, I am just about to order the next in sequence 'The Spirit of the Stone'.
Yes, there are many characters in this book and you do read their adventure as separate stories, but, to me, this way of writing is fascinating. Admittedly, I did have to flick the pages back a couple of times to pick up on a name or situation that I hadn't remembered, but overall it is an excellent adventure with some very interesting characters, the fire dragon being one! I'm sure some readers will recognise either themselves or a friend in this character!
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Average
Rating  (2)
Date: 2005-12-21
1 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
I can see what Maggie Furey was trying to do with this book, and for the most part, it was a success. The book has an original plot, original characters, and a great style of writing that drew me in the the Artefacts of Power books.
However. I found this book, and the ones that followed, to be a little hard to read. Not in that I couldn't understand them, but that I just wasn't interested enough in what the story was about. The characters are well written, but there are LOTS of them, and the story flicks between this great number quite often, not allowing the reader to settle into one story before it throws you into another.
For some, this may be exactly what they want. But for me, there has to be a lot of depth in a book and especially its characters. While they were interesting, I cared very little about them, and perhaps more time spent on developing these characters rather than creating many others, would make the book a little more heartfelt.
Good book, average read.
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the heart of myrial
Rating (4)
Date: 2003-08-21
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book was the first book I have read by Maggie Furey.Like it is when you start a book by an author for the first time it took some getting into.The story also took a while to get started but when it did it became a truly gripping book.When reading this book you just get deeper and deeper into the plot then the book runs out of pages ,make sure you have spirit of the stone to start straight away and lose yourself in Maggie furey`s amazing fantasy world.
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Amazing!!!!!!!!!
Rating  (5)
Date: 2002-10-27
3 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
Why other reviewers have only given this four stars I don't know. This book is wonderfully constructed and has a complex plot with different characters stories intertwining. Full of imagination and originality, I highly recommend this to any fantasy fan.
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Worth a read
Rating (4)
Date: 2002-10-06
3 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
A very good story. The 'good guys' are not always pure, which makes it more realistic. The heroine has some psychological problems which she has to overcome to become the heroine. Some dark moments, which are part of the overall story. Highly recommended by me, for those into fantasy stories. Only negative is that when the book ends it's not the end of the story. So get the Spirit of the Stone at the same time, if you can. I've just pre-ordered the Eye of Eternity
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