The Wild Road
The Wild Road series, Book 1
Gabriel King
Del Rey
Fiction, Fantasy
Themes: Alchemy, Anthropomorphism, Felines, Magic Workers
**
Description
Since the first creatures walked the earth, the wild roads have served as their heart. Flowing like invisible highways, these conduits of ancient and untamed magicks
encircle the earth. Felines have long been the guardians of this network of otherworldly energy, protecting it from those who would corrupt or destroy it. The Majicou is
the latest guardian of the wild roads, and soon he shall face a new challenge. At the next vernal equinox, the King and Queen of cats will bear the prophesied Golden Cat,
a being of great powers. An ancient enemy of the wild roads, the human Alchemist, has long sought a key to harness the energies of the highways for himself. With the
Golden Cat, he may succeed.
At the end of his last life, the Majicou has little strength beyond his domain - certainly not enough for this all-important task. A cat must be sent to find the King and
Queen and safeguard them as they travel to Tintangel, the convergence of the wild roads. This task falls to Tag, who starts out as a pampered house pet. Soon, he will
have to step forward and claim his heritage as guardian of the wild roads, or the entire world will suffer.
Review
Having read and enjoyed Tailchaser's Song (by Tad Williams), I had high hopes for King's feline fantasy novel. Those hopes didn't last long. Most of the
characters were uninteresting, the situations convoluted and strange, and the plot simply didn't make as much sense as the author apparently felt it did. I found myself
thinking that portions of the manuscript had been cut, or maybe I was missing parts of conversations. If it was cut, the editors cut the wrong parts. It drug in several
spots, where the cats traveled across lengthily-described distances, and the author felt compelled to name every turn and street they took when in towns. Tad Williams
did a much better job creating a feline fantasy world, in part because he wisely kept the action away from humans and human habitations for most of the book. King's
writing style includes many obscure human references which killed my suspension of disbelief. One second, she's comparing a cat's face to an ancient Norman helmet, and
the next she's having Tag puzzle over road machinery and other mundane city objects. One globetrotting cat even knew commercial jet planes by manufacturer and model
number, and all were impossibly familiar with human names for feline breeds. Was King writing from a feline viewpoint, or as a human telling the tale? I wished she'd
made up her mind.
As for the characters and story, they failed to engage me. The Majicou's yet another in a long line of fictional mentors who don't actually mentor, somehow expecting
their green student to pick up knowledge that it's implied took years, lifetimes even to accumulate simply by being tossed into the deep end of the pool. The Alchemist
was the sort of omnipotent yet impotent bad guy whose minions showed up whenever the plot needed them, inflicting no more damage than necessary before vanishing just as
quickly - and inexplicably - as they arrived. Most of the characters were selectively intelligent (though the King of Cats proves even duller than that), so they were
difficult to care about, let alone root for. The entire ending sequence seemed like it was designed for the author to show off with; too many flashes and magical tricks
for its own good. If it had been a movie, I would've accused King of going overboard on the unnecessary FX just for the sake of having a spectacular finale sequence to
hype in the commercials.
Ultimately, I just plain didn't feel this story come to life as a good story ought to. I liked a few stray parts of it, and a few supporting characters were intriguing.
The Wild Road may be getting high praise from high sources, but not from this cat-lover, sadly.