Location: Australia
Member Since: June 22, 2015

Scarlet Creed

Smashwords book reviews by Scarlet Creed

  • The Ishim Underground on June 25, 2015

    Perception of The Ishim Underground by Carrie Bailey. Reading Carrie's novel was a delight from the beginning as it immediately filled me with ideas for my own novels and that is what a great author does. You can tell you're reading a good book when it inspires you to write something grand out of pure excitement, yet can't as yet because you need to read on. It is quite the conundrum to decide. I, however, have decided to take time out to write my thoughts, because the book is so interesting that I know if I read on the colourful descriptions, coupled with my excitement at having found a book worthy of my time, the concepts I want to write about will fade as my mind is assaulted by new excellence. I don't often read much from the post-apocalyptic genre since the Obernewton Chronicles left me emotionally exhausted. And as much as you might think that is a good thing, claiming that at least those books affected me so much, I will tell you otherwise. Sure, you want an emotional connection with the characters because it makes them more real and thus you fully slip into the time and tale of the book. But no-one wants to be a withered wreck. I read fantasy to get away from real life difficulties and horrors. I don't want to find them in the new world I have only just escaped to. The style of writing is odd and threw me constantly as many of the words aren't quite in their correct places. It's really quite subtle in form, actually, because it places the reader in the post-apocalyptic world where many words and meanings haven't survived the transition entirely intact. Imagine growing up thinking the language you're learning is the one true form that your revered ancestors spoke. From outside we as the readers notice it, but from within, ie, for the characters it's normal, if not brilliant. This is further established ironically as the main character, Eron, despises the nomads for brutalising so many of the proper words. It's an amazing concept on the author's part and I wish I'd conceived of it myself. The story itself moves strangely. As the reader following Eron you can't help but sympathise with his plight because he is just a teenager doing what he can to fit into a hostile world that often attacks him in various ways, shifting his perceptions of it. I don't know how I feel about it because the writing style jumped my mind around so much and I had to really focus to understand what the nomads were saying. Yet sometimes it was unintelligible, as speech often is. Wonderful character creation and depiction. Very complicated and often subtle, Bailey doesn't lead the reader along but let's you make assumptions like you're in a mystery novel. But it's not a mystery... Go buy the book and test it out for yourself, but beware: you may need to retreat to a desert island upon completion to rearrange your mind.