Island Realm

Crystal Doors, Book 1

By: Rebecca Moesta, Kevin J. Anderson

Narrated by: Joshua Swanson

Fourteen-year-old cousins Gwen and Vic have lived together ever since the mysterious deaths of Gwen's parents and the disappearance of Vic's mother. But Vic's scientist father accidentally transports them through a magical crystal door to the island of Elantya. Cobblestone streets and silver towers mark the picturesque island, a trading hub and center of knowledge that runs on advanced physics and sorcery.

Vic and Gwen are soon caught in a tempest of ancient magic, vicious creatures, fierce battles, and a territorial feud with the sea-dwelling Merlons.

More Door? Listen to the rest of the Crystal Doors trilogy.©2006 WordFire, Inc. (P)2008 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A charming young adult novel....promises to keep readers turning the pages for many books to come." (Terry Brooks, New York Times best-selling author of The Sword of Shannara.)

Not Bad but Targets the Younger Crowed

I'm not very demanding but I had fun with the series, the story overall is interesting but I agree some of the dialogue is definitely aimed at a younger audience.

Really my only big gripe was the over use of repetitive phrasings or speech styles by 3 of the main characters. The arabian princes' people ALWAYS have a saying for a situation, Gwen is forever prepared with a numbered list of reasons why her side is right which she ticks off on her fingers and Vic continuously uses the speech formula, "X now, Y later". (ie - Fight now, ask questions later)

This persistent but in the scheme of things small annoyance aside it wasn't half bad, happy to use it to burn through my commute.

I just wish we could give half stars, I'd give it a 3.5

wanna be

cookie cutter book, tries to hard to appeal to the teens or tweens. probably would have liked it better, but the auther was annoying to listen to. His reading doesn't flow very well in some areas, and it's like he's trying to talk like a kid. I mean I know it's a kid book, but you can speak normaly. but mabe I'm being too judge mental, I only bought it because it was on sale for like $4, and I enjoy a good fantasy occasionaly, which this was not.

Could be better but it's acceptable entertainment

I love trilogies or any story that continues. I enjoyed the characters of these books but what I had a problem with was the word similarities in things such as Lavasha = Lava, or Affirique which has similar properties to Africa. To me it sounded like the story was created and to make it a little different, they changed words to equal something similar to the English language so there would be no mistaking what it actually was. A good story will have a unique name of an object, and explain what it is so the reader learns and remembers this, but this seemed a little forced. Where is the creativity in another language for another world not a parallel universe ya know?

The other problem I had was the reader had a tendency to be finished with a sentence before the sentence was finished. His annunciation was really terrible at times. He did a good job with making each character have a certain voice or inflection which I enjoyed, but overall, it was an ok story and narration, not one that i'll go listening to over and over.

Strange and Hypnotic I almost fell asleep

Wow Hard to believe Kevin J. Anderson was involved with this super slow paced children's book?
The first 29 minutes are a study of facial expressions and lame dialog.

Had to turn it off at chapter 6, could take no more.

This book was written for tweens

This would have been a great book for me when I was 10, however as an adult it failed to entertain!

In no way is this written by Kevin J. Anderson

I've read or listened to just about everything Anderson has written, including obscure stuff like Hopscotch, all the Dune stuff and his own various series. His writing style is somewhat distinctive and there is no way I will believe for a second he penned a word of this book. Perhaps he helped with the story arc a little bit, but even that doesn't feel like his style.

It is clearly an example of an established writer using his name to sell books for a starting writer.

The writing has a very weak, childish tone, this is probably a kids' book, it was painful to listen to. The narrator also did a horrible job, sounding like a whiny child. Though most of the book was children whining, so I suppose I can't blame her too much, it still made an unpleasant listen even worse. The story/plot, such as there was, was incredibly weak and stupid.

Not my cup of tea

What would have made Island Realm better?

Listened to 4 chapters and it did not catch my interest. I had to give up.

Would you be willing to try another book from Rebecca Moesta and Kevin J. Anderson ? Why or why not?

No. I don't like fantasy. Not sure how I got this book, may have been a freebee or on sale.

Painful

I really did try to listen to the whole story, but I just couldn't do it. It was too painful. I really try to finish all books I read or listen to, but this reader was just awful. Most of his adult characters sounded the same and not in a good way. Sort of reminded me of what a Barney (the purple dinosaur) family reunion would sound like. It is insulting to kids! I will probably read this book on my own but I will never listen to another story done by this reader!