NOTE: This is a backlog of my notes from SPFBO9. It may look a little rough. My apologies!
You can read my final thoughts on the contest here: Tom Mock’s SPFBO9’s Opening Reads Final Thoughts | JamReads – Making your TBR closer to infinite
- Emma L Adams, Death’s Disciple
A wounded veteran watches the funeral pyre of the King, her leg cramping after long hours watching the rites, except there is no body to burn. Assassinated at sea, the King was never found.
The prose is grounded, competent, descriptive, focused on its MC, and revealing of the world bit by bit, drawing me into the story. The mystery, if a mystery it is, as to whether the King is truly dead, is deeply intriguing.
This story opens at a moment of transition. Something big has already happened, and now we get to find out what that means for our MC and the world of their life.
Characters are deftly and briefly introduced. As are religious(?) disciples, officials, and mention of enemy nation/groups. These orienting details, along with the sensory details of our MC and her thoughts all makes me feel immersed in the world.
The opening is a prologue and goes on much longer than I read. I don’t know yet if time will jump forward or back, but I did know very quickly that this was going to be a yes from me.
It also begins with a kind of summary of past events, but as this is the first book of this series I suppose that is meant to be like the crawl in Star Wars, setting some of the stage preliminarily.
The narrative is taking its time introducing a driving conflict of this story for our MC, but the circumstances are so starkly presented, I’m confident my time is well spent with this story. It is no surprise to me find it is a semi-finalist. I’m in!
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/128104341-death-s-disciple
Day 74
- Ben Green, Forged in the Fallout
In calm Appalachia, our MC has a quiet, difficult life, watching his dad struggle to breathe, terrified of how it will feel if he ever watches him stop – until a secret world of magic from Dad’s past changes everything
This has a strong voice, and the profoundly human, familial emotion of our MC pulled me quickly into the story.
This starts in modern life, and the portrait of that life was immediate and detailed. As contemplative as the opening may be, it does not spare any time in getting the story moving. The stakes couldn’t be higher. And then suddenly everything changes
Though billed as YA, I think this has great crossover appeal. Though our MC is young, Green’s sensibilities quickly create characters with depth and strong personal conflicts.
The setting is simply, but elegantly rendered with some very fine prose that was a pleasure to read. I can’t begin to guess just how much everything is about to change for our MC, and the nature of the hidden magical world he is about to be plunged into.
This seems inventive and well written. I would recommend everyone read the opening pages just to see how well Green introduces our MCs quiet anguish. I’m in.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58304381-forged-in-the-fallout
- Grace Bridges, Volcano City
I think this is a well written YA. It’s a book 2, tho, and it very much reads like it, referencing previous events with blocks of text.
That said, those events have piqued my interest. The device by which the author brings them to the forefront of her MCs mind as she races in a modern day track practice, breaking through the mists of forgotten memory, work well.
The details of some magical adventure our MC had beginning with a cabin in the woods and some sort of boiling stream that did not burn her when she lay in it – it all grabs my attention!
But this feels like the wrong book to begin reading. It makes me want to hunt up book 1. Sadly, that means it’s out of the SPFBO, and out of my list.
If any of that makes you curious, it looks like this book has been collected into a series omnibus you could inspect.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/55740803-earthcore-books-1-3
Day 75
- Luís Falcão de Magalhães @AuthorLuisM, The Daughter of The Ice
A coup attempt is foiled, the mastermind and his assassins caught in their own trap. An old knight shows his prowess.
This wastes no time. It starts right away, introducing its two primary characters, the knight and the old fox who has plotted a coup. The old man has a hard spirit, and is evocatively described as such.
This tells me just exactly what I need to know and hurries along. The dialogue is pointed. The action punches across the page. The fight is bloody, but thoughtful, and has good tension.
Ch1 (I read the prologue) follows the old schemer. I don’t know whether we’ll be leaving our knight behind now. I hope not, but I’m nonetheless eager to know more about this hard old man.
I’d like to know more about who he is and why he’s tried to kill the patriarch, and what this ice culture is he’s come from, etc, but I don’t mind the opening focusing more narrowly on the action.
The prose is competent, active, and detailed, and those details make the world of the story feel unique. I’ll happily keep reading to find out where this goes next. I’m in.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/122777567-the-daughter-of-the-ice
- D Heyman @minds_press, A Donkey, a Stablehand and An Empire
A man checks into a city looking for a new start. That’s where wealth and prosperity is, they said! Maybe…not so much.
This has a simple opening, following our traveler into town to find a room, but it has some nice details, good competent prose, and natural, even entertaining dialogue.
It has something of a travelogue quality to it. For the moment we’re just following our MC around. He gets a room and goes to sleep. Nothing happens.
There is a hint of humor, but not as much as I was expecting from the title. I’ve read most of Mark Twain’s travelogues, and they can be a roaring good time, especially with his dry wit.
It’s easy to read, tho, and our MC seems a bit like an earnest loser. There’s something compelling about that to me. And there’s some good little details along the way to help ground me in the story.
The author has made a decision to invent new words for measuring distance and time instead of inches, seconds, etc. That might become immersive. For now it’s a little confusing.
But this is clear and easy reading despite being somewhat flat, and my interest is piqued regarding the title. I’d give it another few sections to really win me over. I’m in.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57575570-a-donkey-a-stablehand-and-an-empire
- James F Mordechai, A Crack In The World
This next dark title handles its opening poorly. The details seem to appear on the page when they occurred to the author, almost randomly.
The setting seems interesting and there is something almost lovecraftian happening, but there’s an awkwardness about the prose and what details we get when that is requiring me to rearrange the pieces to get a clear picture of the story.
In short order there’s a very odd detail about breath on a neck feeling warm that enters our MCs mind even as he’s presumably being chased to his death.
This opening feels slapped together. It’s disorienting and lacks a clear introduction. Sorry. I pass.
Day 76
- Shan Syed, Cities of the River
A farmer dressed up in armor defends a town gate, but then dies. I think there was too little here for me to recommend this read.
The prose was clear enough, but lacked detail. It was somewhat plodding. The action was described more in summary than in an immersive style that made me feel a part of the action.
The focus of the chapter was locked tight onto our farmer turned soldier, his thoughts of his dead wife, dead sons and daughters, and one living child, but these thoughts lack specificity.
That isn’t bad in and of itself, but it is a trend in this opening. I get little out of it except that this place (town or city, I don’t know) is being attacked. There are walls, but no parapets, it seems.
This farmer’s family was caught unaware by the attacking host somehow. The baddies pour in. They fight. He dies. They are generically referred to as the Enemy. They have wicker shields and mean faces.
It just doesn’t amount to enough for me to want to read on. It’s borderline, but lacking. This may be a case of a prologue getting in the way of ch1. Pass.
- Jeff McIntyre, The Garden Gnome
A shadow speaks to an old man with no name at a volcano. He knows her, whoever she is, but she does not appear and yet is there. He tells her to let her die. ”She” leaves…
The promising whimsy of this title does not fit the story. The prologue was dark, somewhat vague, and melodramatic.
There were tense issues from the opening paragraph, but those seemed to stabilize. The prose was competent enough, but I feel there was too little in this prologue to make me read on.
It almost hits at a story, but there is too little for me to grasp what that story might be. There are no names, no details beyond what the old man carries.
Vagueness plus melodrama is always going to be a hard sell for me. If all I have is oversized emotion without context, I don’t have enough. Pass.
Day 77
- Alec Hutson, The Book of Zog
I’m struggling to know just how to talk about this next opening and my critique of it. There’s nothing wrong with an abstract opening in a bizarre, magical space.
The problem for me may be general rather than specific. It isn’t that there’s not enough detail, or that there isn’t enough of a character on the page – we have the birth of an otherworldly horror.
It’s true that character doesn’t seem to be motivated in any way yet to drive a story. They just hatched.
Ultimately, I think this just doesn’t do enough, and what it does do struck me as, well, uninteresting to me. This is billed as cozy. It doesn’t seem to be. I pass.
- Mark McKerracher @MJMckerracher, Mordicax
A plague spreads in the village. The devil sent it. It starts as a dark grit in the eyes. In six days, your dead.
Great opening. Real strong voice, short and sweet and full of promise. There’s even a sense of humor lurking behind the seemingly unstoppable spread of the Grit.
The means of the diseases spread is mysterious. People are sick before they realize it. Houses are burned. Trees where people fell sick. It makes no difference. The plague spreads.
Into this invisible catastrophe, our MC, a daughter living on an outlying farm, enters. Her blind father is terrified of disease. But the local nun pulls her and her sister into helping her fetch things while she cares for the sick.
“I looked at my hands – my clean, beautiful hands – and said, ‘We’re going to die.’”
Wonderful stuff. The prose is exact. It is understated and to the point. This makes every page feel active.
I really can’t guess what’s going to happen next. I want to know if the devil really did send this plague. I want to read on to get a better sense of just where and when this is set (approximately).
I want to see if our sisters really are doing to die. This is really a fantastic opening, colored with strokes of Nathanial Hawthorne and King’s The Stand.
Based on the strength of this opening, the exacting dialogue and descriptions and voice and emerging characters, I’m surprised it’s not a semi-finalist – but then, novels are more than their openings. In any case, I’m in!
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/64355822-mordicax
Tom Mock 
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