Official Review: Cycles of the Phoenix by C.A. Nicholas

[Jasy95]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Cycles of the Phoenix" by C.A. Nicholas.]

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2 out of 4 stars

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Cycles of the Phoenix by C.A. Nicholas is a compilation of three books that explore characters facing obstacles such as depression, anxiety, abuse, sexual assault, and suicidal thoughts. The first book, Sanity’s War, is composed of a series of short stories. The first story takes the reader to a physical battle with monstrous beings, and the rest of the stories mainly segue through several characters that are struggling with mental health issues. The second book, Strange: And Other Accounts from the Taboo War depicts short stories of characters that are struggling with depression, self-harm, and suicidal thoughts. In several of the stories, these mental struggles are personified as bat-like creatures that are invisible to most people, luring the afflicted characters into their own negative mental spirals. The last book, Kaya, Where Have You Gone? tells one overall story of Kaya and Fumi, who are both young girls trying to overcome traumas such as sexual abuse, self-harm, and suicide.

Although this book is characterized as fantasy, I don’t necessarily agree with that classification. Out of all the short stories in this collection, only a handful of them had any elements of fantasy. For those that did have elements of fantasy, they were mainly used as metaphors for mental disorders and traumas. The only story that seemed focused on fantasy without being a clear metaphor was the first story, Nicephore. The rest of the stories were focused on traumas that take place in the real world, including abuse, child abduction, depression, self-harm, and suicide. The heavy themes of these stories were graphic at times. I thought that these were important topics to discuss in such a graphic manner, because these are real struggles that people experience every day, and we should not shy away from discussing them.

The writing style shifted in each story and was often difficult for me to get through. The author used a poetic prose, which I commend him for, but there were many grammatical errors that made it difficult for me to stay immersed in the stories. Many of the stories were filled with excessive adverbs and adjectives that made the sentences confusing to read. Additionally, some of the stories felt very heavy and significant, but others felt like they had very little plot and character movement. In many of the stories of the first two books, there was a repetitive theme in which the difficulties of dealing with mental disorders was showcased, and then encouraging statements were made about relying on those who love you and not giving up hope. Although this is a great motivational message, it felt a bit formulaic after it had been used in several stories, especially when the same words and sentences were repeated to get the message across.

My favorite stories were those that were less repetitive and stood apart from the rest of the collection. In the first book, my favorite stories were Nicephore, Neha, and Reunion: Remembrance & Inspiration. Nicephore depicted a battle between unique creatures with well-written action scenes. Neha was an emotional story about children that were trying to escape being trafficked in India. Reunion: Remembrance & Inspiration showed a detailed description of the life of a man struggling with mental disorders, exploring how his struggles had impacted those who cared for him. My favorite story in the second book was Strange, which introduced the plot in an interesting and powerful way. Most of the rest of the stories in the second book felt repetitive and did not stand out to me. The third book was not for the faint of heart, as it was distressing to read about the horrors that these young girls were experiencing. There were a few chapters in the middle that deviated from the plot to tell a story that Kaya was writing with her mom. I thought that this deviation was a bit jarring and did not really add anything to the story. Other than that, I thought that the story was cohesive, well-written, and executed in a powerful manner.

Overall, I rate this book 2 out of 4 stars. The author did a great job of discussing important subject matters of dark situations that many people silently struggle with. However, there were a lot of inconsistencies in the quality of the stories and the writing style. The grammatical errors and repetitive stories keep me from giving this book a rating higher than a 2. I would recommend this book to those who are struggling with traumatic experiences or mental health issues and want to read about others in similar situations. However, the stories are graphic and not all of the characters have happy endings, so any readers who would be sensitive to that should not read this book.

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Cycles of the Phoenix
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[Becca Olsson]

I find it interesting that the mental health issues appear as physical creatures, even if no one else can see them. I feel like that’s as close to reality as you can get. Thanks for the great review!

[NetMassimo]

This compilation addresses sensitive issues but the style might be too peculiar to be easily accessible. I hope the author will at least do another round of proofreading to make the book more readable. Thank you for your honest review!

[Jasy95]

I find it interesting that the mental health issues appear as physical creatures, even if no one else can see them. I feel like that’s as close to reality as you can get. Thanks for the great review!

I definitely agree, it was a unique metaphor that was really effective!