Review of The Shade of Highfall

[vparsons]

[Following is a volunteer review of "The Shade of Highfall" by Mark O'Dell.]

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3 out of 4 stars

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Everyone in Highfall knows the fey are long gone, and only their distant sylvan descendants remain to walk the Earth. Without these higher powered beings to help maintain balance, the citizens of Highfall find themselves up against a much darker magic led by the sinister Cyrus Col. Among these citizens is the orphan Shrew. Shrew does not yet know where she came from or what her true purpose in life is, but with the help of her friends, and the fey, she will soon find out. The Shade of Highfall by Mark O'Dell provides a wonderful fantasy world full of magic and cunning, friendship and betrayal, and a grand adventure.

This story's positive aspects shine in the growth of the female protagonist Shrew. Most of the wording used is easy to follow and provides an accurate description of what the world could have been like in the sixteenth century. There were plenty of words O'Dell used that required my pulling up the dictionary, which I personally find refreshing. The world O'Dell has created is vast and fantastical and really is a great place to visit through the written word.

The downsides I found in this story were that of editing. It has always thrilled me to find mistakes in a published novel because I've aspired to be an editor. That being said, a published work should not include any distracting mistakes. It appeared to me that the author chose to name a character Vaskah Shen after originally naming them Vashah Shen and missed some of the spelling swaps, or the spelling of Vashah is simply a mistake that no one caught or took the time to change.

I give this book a rating of 3 out of 4 stars. The plot is well laid out and the story keeps the reader interested. However, I did not rate it any higher due to the mistakes that I found while reading. Those include misspelled words such as a main character's name, and 'carries' as seen in this sentence on page 176: "One carry's a crossbow and all have swords".

I would recommend The Shade of Highfall to a young adult or adult audience. There are plenty of situations mentioned that are negatively sexual and insinuate rape, and others involving gore and murder. These may be too heavy or dark for a younger audience. Otherwise, the story and language used follow the same category of plenty of other young adult novels that I have read in the past.

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The Shade of Highfall
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