Distributed Multimedia Database Technologies Supported by MPEG-7 and MPEG-21
Book
A multimedia system needs a mechanism to communicate with its environment, the Internet, clients,...
Effective Documentation: What We Have Learned from Research
Book
Effective Documentation is a major sourcebook that offers technical writers, editors, teachers, and...
Imagining Home: American War Fiction from Hemingway to 9/11
Book
War has often been seen as the domain of men and thus irrelevant to gender analysis, and American...
The Dating of Beowulf: A Reassessment
Book
"This book will be a milestone, and deserves to be widely read. The early Beowulf that...
Transcendence and the Concrete: Selected Writings
Jean Wahl, Alan Schrift and Ian Alexander Moore
Book
Jean Wahl (1888-1974), once considered by the likes of Georges Bataille, Gilles Deleuze, Emmanuel...
Doctor Who Main Range - 219 Absolute Power
Colin Baker, Jamie Anderson, Simon Holub and Miranda Raison
Book
Two thousand years ago, all civilisation on the planet Teymah was wiped out in an AELE - an...
The Alzheimer's Solution: A Breakthrough Programme to Prevent and Reverse the Symptoms of Cognitive Decline at Every Age
Dean Sherzai and Ayesha Sherzai
Book
'The Alzheimer's Solution is a very important book on the role of lifestyle in successful cognitive...
Christians and Jews in Angevin England: The York Massacre of 1190, Narratives and Contexts
Sarah Rees Jones and Sethina C. Watson
Book
The mass suicide and murder of the men, women and children of the Jewish community in York on 16...
Ross (3284 KP) rated The Shattered Realm of Ardor Benn in Books
Mar 12, 2021
The second Ardor Benn book is another epic tale of the ruse artist taking on the royal family. The first book saw Ard's efforts depose the current king and save the dragon race (and hence the world). Sadly, the replacement royalty is no better and the Great Chain is now scattered into different, warring islands. Ard finds himself embroiled in a plot to unearth the conspiracy that the new king's dead nephew, and the rightful heir, is not actually dead.
There is also an interesting new subplot where we see a university professor tasked with discovering new Grit types (the world's magic system, whereby different materials once digested and fired by a dragon produce different magical results). This angle, like the industrial/medical revolution is surprisingly thrilling, with additional intrigue as the results become the interests of some unsavoury characters.
Ard and Raek are once again superb and quickly put together a plot to infiltrate a secret criminal underworld and discover the whereabouts of the true king. The secrecy and plotting, and use of the world's magic makes for some excellent exciting passages.
There are the usual twists and turns along the way, as the security measures in place in the secret society make it hard for Ard to progress too quickly.
As with the first book, the true nature of this strange world is unveiled a little more over the course of the book in spectacular fashion.
A wonderful fun read.


