Prophecy
Author: Ellen Oh
Series: The Dragon King Chronicles #1
Genre: Young Adult, Romance, Historical Fiction, Fantasy
Publisher: HarperTeen
My Rating:
Summary:
Kira’s the only female in the king’s army, and she’s also the prince’s bodyguard. She’s a demon slayer and an outcast, hated by nearly everyone in her home city of Hansong. And, she’s their only hope…
Murdered kings and discovered traitors point to a demon invasion, sending Kira on the run with the young prince. He may be the savior predicted in the Dragon King Prophecy, but the legendary lost ruby treasure just might be the true key to victory. With only the guidance of the cryptic prophecy, Kira must battle demon soldiers, evil shaman, and the Demon Lord himself to find what was once lost and raise a prince into a king.
Intrigue and mystery, ancient lore and action-packed fantasy come together in this heart-stopping first book in a trilogy.
First Sentence: People feared Kira.
My Review:
Many people warned me away from Prophecy. Stay away! they say. It’s not worth your time they say. You will regret it! others say. I am so, so sad that I didn’t listen to them because honestly, Prophecy was a disappointment. Okay, maybe the cover (seriously covers, stop lying to me!) of Prophecy convinced me to read Prophecy, but I was also hoping for an action packed book about a female Korean warrior who everyone depends on to save their kingdom, but instead, I got a boring, tedious book that just didn’t work. Guess I’m better off reading Stormdancer sometime in the future instead.
The main problem with Prophecy was the writing. Prophecy started out really good. It was full of action, mysterious, and fun. However, as the book went on, the writing became tedious. Everything was told, not shown, and some phrases were just plain awkward together. Yes, I get that we Asian people say “Ya!” sometimes in the beginning of our sentences and maybe “Eh,” but to suddenly put that in when the scene didn’t call for it just makes the entire book not flow well. The pacing of Prophecy could also be a lot better too: there were huge amounts of training and journey information that repeats over and over again.
I also hate it when the summary of the book reveals too much. I always read the summary of the book before I read the actual book and according to Prophecy‘s summary, everything depends on Kira, so it’s quite obvious what role she plays in Prophecy. However, when I see her denying her obvious role in the actual book, deflecting it, and pushing it onto someone else, all the way until the end of the book when, finally, it’s revealed that she is indeed to play out that role – it just makes me so mad. Why give readers an important clue/hint in the summary that they will figure out easily if you’re planning on dragging the whole situation until the very end of the book? Why?
And you know when the bad guy suddenly reveals his ultimate evil plan to the good guys for no reason whatsoever in movies? Prophecy felt like that. There’s a part where Kira sees a new kind of demon she never saw before, asks him who he is, and he suddenly reveals the truth about himself, possibly giving a vital clue to Kira in the sequels. I was like what? Why would the demon suddenly just do that? I would be like well, you’ll just have to find out yourself silly girl.
Even though Prophecy was pretty much not so good in general, I have to give Ellen Oh some major credit for the awesome Korean elements she woven in into her story. I could tell that she did some massive research before writing her book. In fact, some Korean words were explained in full detail that I didn’t have to flip to the glossary at the back of the book to look up what the word meant. It also helped that I watched some K-dramas in the past.
I honestly don’t know if I’ll be giving the sequel to Prophecy, Warrior, a try. Okay, maybe I want to know who Kira ends up with, but in that case, I’ll just take a sneak peek at the ending of the third and final book in the series to see. In the end, maybe you’ll make the same foolish decision I did and decide to read Prophecy, but I’m warning you, it’ll be one rocky ride.
I just finished the book and for me the prose came off as stilted, it’s like what happens when someone translates Chinese into English, it’s sloppy and quite stiff. I wanted to like this book, but eh. ;_;
Great review! I didn’t really like the writing style either. It was very overt- as in, the author spelled everything out for the reader (perhaps because it was more a novel for middle-graders rather than young adult)
I never knew it was a novel for middle-graders! Interesting point though.
Great point about Prophecy sounding like it’s Chinese being translated into English! I never thought of it that way, but yeah, it totally sounds like that.
This sounded and looks so promising! I was especially interested in the Korean aspect but I think it’s not worth my time.
I recently started hearing about this book, but I think I didn’t hear about her before her newest novel though the covers are interesting for this series. Hopefully I get to read this one at some point in the future. Would love to find out why Ellen Oh is a great writer :)
I think i suffer form the same thing of falling for covers.. and blurbs. Prophesy sounds soooo great and it’s really disappointing to see that’s its got nothing exceptional. *shakes head*
Good review! I didn’t really care for this book either. I thought it would be a great story with demon slaying, but I wasn’t into it.