Cornerstone

Cornerstone (Souls of the Stones #1)

by Kelly Walker

3 stars

344 pages 

Published Oct. 22, 2012, by Kelly Walker 

Omnibus published May 15, 2013, by All Night Reads

 
I am reading this as part as the complete "Souls of the Stones" 3-book omnibus that I received from NetGalley and All Night Reads.
As a fantasy, this is a bit slow at first. Usually, there's lots of action and sword fighting and cloaks and dragons and stuff like that - at least in all the Robert Jordan books that I've read - namely the Wheel of Time series. Here, it seems that this first book is just setting the stage for the rest of the books. Lots of the dialogue is repeated, which is annoying. There are some inconsistencies, too. And the idea of the "Stones" is hardly touched on in the first half of the book. There is the requisite "quest," which involves lots of traveling by horseback and by foot, so in that sense it fits into the fantasy category.
In the attempt of keeping the "bad guy" a secret, I got confused. I had to re-read passages to try and figure out who exactly was talking.
Also, the author likes to skip immediate explanations (such as how Em escaped Russel) and wait, like, 50 pages before we find out how it all went down. It was distracting from the rest of the book, I kept thinking about "How did she get away???" It wasn't until that explanation appeared was I able to refocus.
Luckily, things gets better - roughly 2/3 of the way through the book. The pace starts to pick up, and it gets entertaining. But still no sword fighting! Bummer! And there was a gun, which was weird.
And a love story starts to develop. But that's waaaay towards the end. So don't expect anything right away.
I will be reading the next in the series, as I think things will get better as the story continues.
Thank you NetGalley and All Night Reads for allowing me to review this book.