The universe of Orberana is a place of great wonder and peril, a dizzying landscape filled with clouds that can talk, clockwork beings that mark their own time, and painted animals that awake in the night. Shiewo Morose is the captain of a flying ship powered by music. She is also a determined young woman on a mission: a quest to find the Wishing Fish that created Orberana.
Sailing above the clouds, Shiewo and her crew (Erduu the bamboo, Theo the cloud, Livingston the goldfish, and Felix the painter) are headed for worlds of crazed clockwork bureaucrats, tyrannic kings, and tornado children--worlds that will test not only the crew's bravery... but their very understanding of adventure.
Theirs is the odyssey of a lifetime...
I want to start my review by pointing out what a genius Ciye Cho is. You only need to visit his website to see this; hear the music he composed for the book, the illustrations he's done, the fantastic informative interactive page. Yes, Ciye Cho is a genius. Better yet, he is a genius with such an inventive imagination, yes this fantasy book goes beyond the realms of imaginative and reaches a place so much further away. I was totally lost in Shiewo's adventure, it's colourful and has this light, childish draw to it that is so lacking in the market these days.
I loved the characters - Shiewo is very strong and out-there, and I really loved her. Erduu is the funny one, I loved Erduu! Theo was my favourite though, he reminds me of Flounder from The Little Mermaid, worrying all the time and just being downright cute! These characters totally had me loving this story.
I felt as though the pacing was a bit off, for such a fantastic, imaginative storyline, so much could have happened but at a few times there wasn't enough going on and I felt myself slowly getting bored. I was always grabbed back into the story but still would have liked the pacing to be a little more consistent.
Overall, Shiewo was a very imaginitive fantasy that I would recommend to anyone after something fun! Definitely a great book from a very inventive mind!
Overall Rating: B
Stand alone/Series: First in a series
Book received from the author in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you for this review! Ciye Cho asked me to review Shiewo but I haven't got round to it yet. However, since you said it's pretty good I'll bump it up the pile now. Thanks! New follower!
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