An Indie Review - Fogbound - N.J. Alexander

 Ok so a bit of housekeeping first. I got my copy of Fogbound for free because Nick decided to give the book away as a birthday present to himself (I don’t understand it either but I like his style). There was no obligation to read or review the book but I feel like an honest review of Fogbound is the least I can do in return. I’m also relatively friendly with the author on twitter, this doesn’t influence my review of fogbound. Scouts honour.

So where to start. Fogbound is a sort of accidental hero, band of brothers style fantasy in which our protagonist Zercien finds himself slap bang in the middle of a war which, as a history teacher, he has no business being a part of. Fogbound is unlike anything I’ve read before. Maybe something exists and I just haven’t read it yet but for me it’s a truly original concept and story.

A big plus for me is that the author manages so get information to the reader without over explaining or infodumping, it all feels really organic as the layers of the story are peeled back. It’s something I don’t see too much in Indie so I was happy to see it done so well here. On that front you also don’t have all aspects of the story just laid out for you, as the reader you’re very much left to figure things out on your own. This is to say the book is overly complicated, it’s just written the way fiction should be. Far too often I’m reading books that feel more like the authors notes, in contract this feels well developed.

The characters are the true star of fogbound for me, and surprisingly the standout isn’t Zercien or even Euvard. The best characters in my opinion are Lloyd (even though I hate that he’s called Lloyd), The Boil Faced Man and Mayla, in that order. Lloyd is so unintentionally funny, whilst also being terrifying, if Gar from TFATF had an emo phase, it’s Lloyd. The boil faced man gets a mention just for how hideously uncomfortable every single scene he played a part in felt, and Mayla. God I loved Mayla, in the same way I loved Yas in The Last War until she got a bit mental.

I understand none of this is really a coherent review but it’s midnight so stick with me.

There were a couple of bits I didn’t like about the book and I will offer the same caveat I always do which is that this is my personal taste alone, I’m in no way qualified to tell you what is good or bad and I’ll not dwell on it. Personally I thought small aspects of the dialogue felt inorganic and overly storybook (aware that this is indeed a story book), the descriptive writing falls into that common indie trap of being adjective heavy where it doesn’t need to be and I thought that Zercien was relatively weak at times as a main character, though it’s entirely possibly that he was drowned out by a fantastic supporting cast.

I found the pacing to be a little off at times and it meant I struggled to immerse myself, but I honestly attribute that to the fact I read this book on Kindle which is always a struggle for me. I don’t think this is an issue with the book.

I was geared up to give this book 3.5 stars, namely for the quality of the character work, originality of its concept the quality of the writing and the strength of the world Nick creates in a relatively short word count. I’m bumping that up to 4 stars because the ending and forward premise were done masterfully.

It’s a cliche line that I’m aware I use far too often but you can really feel the author grow throughout this book, it starts interesting and ends strong. I can’t wait to see what the second book brings and what else Nick brings to the table, especially for Lloyd, my favourite angry stabby goth warrior.