Quest for Nobility (A Fantasy Adventure) [NOOK Book]

Read this book

I am not a writer so no flamboyant review. Superbly written and with a great plot. You will read it to the very end.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Fascinating idea, neat blend of fantasy and sci fi

The Kingdom of Otharia is no longer ruled by a king - instead there are duchies, each ruled by a duke and a Grand Counsel over which a Grand Duke, elected by his peers, rules. Long ago Otharia explored Earth, but when the exploration team is massacred, it is decided to quarantine the planet; however, not everyone obeys that. One of the dukes, reliant upon the mining of crystals for his duchy's wealth, maintains a private portal from deep within one of his mines to a crystal mine on Earth.

Fast forward many centuries and we find Otharia remaining much as it was - but scheming and plotting are in abundance, and who will end up paying the price for the power plays of the greedy? I don't wish to provide more details, as I don't want to spoil the story - it is very fast-paced and any more details I provide will give away something!

I should note that "The Quest for Nobility" is sort of a blend of fantasy and science fiction; while Otharia is a fairly advanced culture, their reliance on psi powers keeps them from exploiting natural resources (other than crystals) in the same way that people of Earth do - Otharia has no cars, airplanes or trains. Trading is done by sea, or items are moved through portals controlled by telekinetics. It is a fascinating idea and one I thought could be further explored; perhaps it will be in future books in the series.

A highly engrossing book, I read this in one long sitting. As mentioned, the story is fast-paced and there are a lot of threads of which to keep track. However, this is only the first book in the series, a fact which is evident in the world-building that occurs. I enjoyed it quite a lot and think any fans of fantasy and soft science fiction will as well. Check it out and look for further books in the series - #2 is already available.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

great Sci-Fi Adventure

This book is for the reader who likes a great sci fi adventure with a bit of royalty thrown in. It has mystery, intrigue and cliff hangers.

This is a really good book for the sci fi enthusiast. I really enjoy all the diffrent powers that the kids have when it comes to the powers of the mind and also the mystery of what is to come.

I hope everyone enjoys this book!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A Great First Book to a Series...

The Quest for Nobility, written by Debra Martin and David Small, is the first book in The Rule of Otharia series. This action packed book takes us into a world where the Telkur twins, Darius and Dyla, are part of a dominant family. Then through unexpected events, their happy lives are thrown into a world of chaos as they discover their parents have been murdered and the family name dishonored. While still trying to cope with the loss, the twins enter into a competition in hopes of using the prize money to keep the family land free of debt. The competition is made up of a series of objectives where each team, made up of three members, must use their psychic abilities and training to reach the objective successfully. However, things don't go according to planned and the twins soon find themselves wanted for murder and have no choice but to flee to the planet Earth until they can figure out what their next course of action will be. Murder, betrayal, and corruption will be revealed while the twins learn who they can and can not trust. I really enjoyed reading The Quest for Nobility and am eager to read book two of the series, The Crystal Facade. The only thing that didn't sit well with me throughout this book was the time frame while Darius and Dyla were on Earth. I may have missed something, but it seemed as though they were only away for a few days, but once back on their planet, the time shifted and made it seem like they were gone longer. I'm interested in seeing if there is a time frame explained in book two that will wrap up that issue for me from book one. However, that being said, I still very much enjoyed reading The Quest for Nobility and am anxious to see how authors Debra Martin and David Small fine tune their skills in book two, The Crystal Facade.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A quest, indeed.

Quest for Nobility is primarily the story of Darius and Dyla Telkur, the twin heirs of the Telkur Duchy. When their parents are murdered and framed for financial fraud, the two find themselves in the precarious position of having to repair the damage done to their family's reputation and wealth. All the while, the nefarious Baron Avikar and other elements from outside nations threaten to unravel what little progress the twins are able to make. Allies are casually murdered and trust must be developed with people who are relative strangers in order to bring the Duchy back to its former glory. One element of this book that really makes me wish I could rate it higher is the relative difference in technology level that exists between Otharia and our own world. In Otharia, the primary mode of transportation in the portal. With the assistance of a crystal, a telekinetic can open a portal across various distances, depending on their skill and the quality of the crystal. As a means of transportation, this is superior to anything in our own world. As a result, though, Otharia has not developed many of the technological advances that have appeared as a result of our own transportation challenges. The only ships in Otharia are powered by wind. There are no cars, no steam, and certainly no airplanes. There isn't even any mention of a horse (though I assume they have some kind of pack-carrying animal for heavy loads). The technology is sufficient to develop firearms, so presumably there are some reasonably advance machining techniques available on their world. This difference was one of my favorite aspects of the book. One of two things that really hurts the book is the electronic formatting. There is no table of contents on the Nook version (can't confirm about the Kindle). The opening of the book runs through a rapid-fire series of short scenes that I would have like to regularly reference as I read through the rest of the chapters, difficult without a table of contents. Another problem that drove me crazy immediately after buying the book is that the book's cover, a fine-looking depiction of a classic coat of arms, can't be viewed on the Nook's full screen. You can look at it online and in the Nook's smaller, color touchscreen, but there's nothing like looking at a lovingly crafted cover between your fingers. With Quest for Nobility, I wasn't able to do that. Another formatting curiosity is the introductions that appears at the beginning of each chapter. These introductions help provide the reader with a 'slice of the world', very handy when trying to familiarize new readers with the key political and Psi-based concepts of the book. However, these introductions appear in a relatively narrow column and are much thinner than the rest of the text. They aren't hard to read, bit it's a bit like having a tiny, textural waterfall in the middle of your e-reader. The author does a good job of communicating the events of the book. There are a few writing quirks. On occasion, a character will repeat, verbatim, a piece of narrative presented to the reader in a previous paragraph. A similar event happens with one of the introductions. While there are not a lot of grammatical errors, there are just enough that I was pulled out of the author's world at some very inconvenient times. This is unfortunate, and thankfully doesn't happen during the book's climactic ending.

A nice start to a new series

Darius and Dyla Telkur are royal twins from the duchy of Telkur. They are imbued with psychic gifts (as all royals are) and live a charmed life... until tragedy strikes. When their parents, the Duke and Duchess of Telkur, are implicated in a dastardly smuggling ring and presumed dead, the twins' uncle, Avikar, takes over the royal duties until the twins are of age. What the twins don't know is that Avikar has his sights set on the Dukedom, and will stop at nothing to get it. A mistimed attempt on the twins' lives results in yet another tragedy, and the blame falls to the twins. Their attempts to win back their duchy and clear their family's name takes them on an exciting adventure to places they never imagined. Time is running short; will they be able to prove their innocence and that of their parents in time to regain control of the royal title and their duchy?

Written by the collaborative team of Debra L. Martin and David W. Small, this fantasy tale is highly imaginative and quite engaging. The authors transitioned to new settings and events by beginning each chapter with a "quote" from the "Chronicles of Otharia." It is in this way the readers are introduced to the rules and customs of the Otharian people. Each quote is paired well with a chapter that demonstrates the quoted information. I found this to be a really effective way to prepare us for what was to happen in the chapter, and supply us with information without having to spell it out in the narrative. It helped tie together a story that was somewhat lacking a smooth flow in events and storyline. The writing, overall, seemed somewhat inconsistent to me, almost as if different parts were written by different authors.

Of the three main characters, Darius, Dyla and Eclair, I felt Eclair was actually the most developed and the most interesting. I got a better sense of his motivations, as well as his strengths and his flaws, than I did of any other character. All of the characters in the story proved interesting, but they were not all developed as well as I would have liked. The dialogue between characters proved a bit flat and stilted in many places, which made it some of the reading occasionally awkward.

The storyline itself is actually quite interesting. I especially liked the way Earth was tied into the Otharian adventure, and I was really interested in how those two planets were related in the past and, perhaps, would be again in the future. I was really able to get into the adventure, although I did wonder to myself several times where the adventure was actually going. It was engaging and moved along at a nice pace, but it almost seemed like several parts of the story were written separately and then stuck together. In addition, there were a few timeline jumps that caught me by surprise- sometimes the storyline picked up where it left off in a previous chapter, and sometimes it jumped time. It felt inconsistent. Although there was a common thread- the battle for the royal throne- sometimes I lost track of where we were headed and why. The ending does a good job in setting up a sequel, and it is a sequel I'm interested in reading.

With a half star boost for the sheer creativity and cleverness in tying Earth together with Otharia (which I thought was the most interesting concept introduced in this story), and the fact that it was engaging and fun to read, I give this:

4 /5 stars @ MotherLode blog

A Great First Book to a Series...

The Quest for Nobility, written by Debra Martin and David Small, is the first book in The Rule of Otharia series. This action packed book takes us into a world where the Telkur twins, Darius and Dyla, are part of a dominant family. Then through unexpected events, their happy lives are thrown into a world of chaos as they discover their parents have been murdered and the family name dishonored. While still trying to cope with the loss, the twins enter into a competition in hopes of using the prize money to keep the family land free of debt. The competition is made up of a series of objectives where each team, made up of three members, must use their psychic abilities and training to reach the objective successfully. However, things don't go according to planned and the twins soon find themselves wanted for murder and have no choice but to flee to the planet Earth until they can figure out what their next course of action will be. Murder, betrayal, and corruption will be revealed while the twins learn who they can and can not trust. I really enjoyed reading The Quest for Nobility and am eager to read book two of the series, The Crystal Facade. The only thing that didn't sit well with me throughout this book was the time frame while Darius and Dyla were on Earth. I may have missed something, but it seemed as though they were only away for a few days, but once back on their planet, the time shifted and made it seem like they were gone longer. I'm interested in seeing if there is a time frame explained in book two that will wrap up that issue for me from book one. However, that being said, I still very much enjoyed reading The Quest for Nobility and am anxious to see how authors Debra Martin and David Small fine tune their skills in book two, The Crystal Facade.

No text was provided for this review.

No text was provided for this review.

No text was provided for this review.