Dawn

February 12, 2007
In this flawed follow-up to Dusk
(2006), a genre-bending amalgam of horror and fantasy that saw the ascendance of the vengeful Mages, Angel and S'Hivez, the dark powers continue their rampage across the land of Noreela, which they condemned to eternal darkness after killing Rafe Baburn and devouring his seed of magic. The fellowship that helped Rafe on his flight across Noreela—Hope, Alishia, Kosar and Trey—is left with one small hope: Alishia's conviction that Rafe passed her a small bit of what he carried; Noreela can be saved if Alishia reaches the mystic city of Kang Kang. Dusk
was a revelation as a shocking, vital tale of a dying land, but Lebbon overplays his hand in this sequel. No longer dying, Noreela is essentially dead and in need of resurrection, and all but the few main characters appear resigned to destruction at the hands of the two-dimensional Mages. Not even Lebbon's wild inventiveness—bio-metal-stone war machines and rolling sentient balls of bone and flesh—can compensate for the hopeless scenario and wooden villains.

March 15, 2007
Magic has returned to the land of Noreela, but the Mages have taken the seed of power for themselves and now raise armies and magical machines to destroy the land. Only a few stand against them, among them a witch, a young man addicted to a substance known as "fledge," and a librarian who is more alive when dreaming than when awake. This sequel toDusk again demonstrates Bram Stoker Award winner Lebbon's consummate talent for viscerally visual fantasy. Coupled with strong and unusual characters and a plot of epic proportions, it belongs in most libraries' fantasy collections.

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.