Title: Iseris: House of Power
Author: A.A. Smith
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN: 979-8345763261
Pages: 201
Genre: Action & Adventure / Fantasy
Reviewer: Anthony Avina
Hollywood Book Reviews
Very few people really understand the power which secrets can have in a person’s life. Whether intentional or not, secrets long buried can alter a person’s course in life – or affect entire nations if the secret is big enough. Regimes have fallen, leadership has changed, and families have been saved or destroyed by long held secrets, and only by revealing or uncovering these secrets can power and control others hold over someone be released.
It is the power of secrets that drives author A.A. Smith’s YA Fantasy novel, Iseris: House of Power. The novel follows Mora, a young woman in a world where magic and power is the norm, and war is on the brink of being unleashed. An average woman with no affinity towards magic, Mora’s world is rocked one morning on the way to school, and her world is turned upside down as lines in the sand are drawn. Soon Mora finds herself on a quest, one which will not only unearth secrets about her home and country, but about her own family as well, changing the course of her life forever.
Immediately readers were thrust into a creative, imaginative and exhilarating world of magic and wonder. The world building and the mythology the author develops not only showcases a brand-new fantasy realm for readers to get lost in, but gives readers the feeling of stepping into a well-established, almost relatable world of unnecessary conflict and struggle that claims the innocent and leaves behind the power hungry in its wake. The imagery in the author’s writing style and world building allowed the reader to feel transported, feeling the tension and the atmosphere of terror that Mora feels in the immediate wake of this life-changing experience.
Fans and readers who enjoy fantasy driven novels, especially those with a coming-of-age twist and a complex yet engaging magic-based system will thoroughly enjoy this narrative. Each twist and turn in this story expertly draws the reader further and further into this fantasy realm, allowing the more emotional and punctuated moments of revelation and character growth for Mora and other characters like Somnus to really feel authentic and engaging from the reader’s perspective. If you haven’t yet, be sure to grab this incredible fantasy driven novel today and prepare for one entertaining cliffhanger of a final chapter in this novel. Iseris: House of Power is a cerebral, suspense-filled fantasy that explores the brutal cost of control and the price of legacy.