From the Cover

 

Sounds like a kickass book, doesn’t it? It is, and it isn’t. Longwinded is the exact term I’d use to describe much of this novel. I should preface this review by saying I've long been a huge fan of Kenyon's work. The Dark Hunter series rank at the top of my "read" pile and I admire her ability to keep each book and each character fresh and new despite writing dozens of them. But this one, just did not make the cut.

I’ve read a couple of previous books in Kenyon’s League Series, so the backstories for every single character was extremely unnecessary for me. For a reader not familiar with the series, perhaps some backstory on key characters is needed, but seriously, the author gives the life story of every character in the novel, even if they don’t factor into the story at all.

 

And that, I think is a major problem with “Born of Silence.” There are way too many secondaries running willy-nilly all over the place. In fact, I’d say a good two thirds of the characters in the book are completely unnecessary. They added nothing and changed nothing. They were fluff, the occasional comedic relief, and beyond that, she could have left them out and the story would remain unchanged.

 

However, the main characters were well written for the most part. Kenyon is a master at characterization and her dialogue (most of the time) is flawless in this book. Sometimes the exchanges bordered on nauseating, but each character had their own flavor. Even without tags, the reader could have picked out who was speaking simply by the word choices and flow of the dialogue.

 

The protagonist, Darling Cruel is a tortured character in many ways. If there’s one thing I applaud Kenyon on in all of her books, it’s that she isn’t shy about making them all suffer. But cheese and crackers, woman, what the hell? What began as a journey through the horrific past and suffering that made Darling Cruel the man he is, a journey that should have helped the reader understand and bond with him, turned into a nosedive into implausibility. Nobody could have lived through what Darling suffered in this book. A pole in his ass? Really? Do we all know what a pole rammed in one’s ass does to a person? Yes? Good. Now, Kenyon adds a hasty and improbable explanation toward the end of the book for his amazing healing powers, but it was too little and way too late. What he endures at the hands of his Sentella torturers had me wondering how he survived the five months it took for his rescuers to find him. And how does Zarya, as leader of the Sentella, not know what is happening to said prisoner, and judge their character so poorly? The excuses she offers just doesn’t fly. Kenyon would have readers believe that Zarya was so worried about finding Darling, who she knew as Kere, who she’s never actually seen, but has slept with and agreed to marry, and as a result of that worry she was blinded to the fact that she had him as a prisoner the entire time. What kind of leader doesn’t check on her minions from time to time, especially when they have a prisoner?

 

But one can let that go in the interest of a great story, right? Sure. The main reason this didn’t work in any way for me is that the heavy narrative and backstory got so bad that I’d just skim over any new revelation of Darling’s past horrors. Almost every chapter has a minimum of one page of revelations.

 

Kenyon fans will be willing to read the entire story, simply because the voice and style remain true to what we love about this author. However, a first-timer would do better checking out her Dark Hunter series first. These books are way better in quality than this particular novel.