The following review appeared in the September issue of Good Reading Magazine:

Attention fans of Robin Hobb and Robert Jordan!

Award-winning Australian children’s author Pamela Freeman has turned her hand to writing fantasy for adults, and lovers of traditional fantasy will devour it. Set in the Eleven Domains, lands which were taken in bloody battle from the native people, now known as Travellers, this is the beginning of a story of epic proportions.

The similarities between the Travellers - a dark-skinned, dark-haired people forced into the nomadic lifestyle of crafters, entertainers and fortune-tellers - and the gypsies of our own world are immediately obvious. While allowing for some subtle political and social comment, this doesn’t bog down the engaging story of young Travellers Bramble and Ash, setting out on two different paths that seem destined to meet when the dark history of their ancestry begins to rise to the surface.

Freeman cuts between subplots and characters with ease, never confusing the reader for a moment. While this is obviously a traditional fantasy in which two accidental heroes find themselves on a mission or journey of great significance, there is nothing predictable about Freeman’s storytelling. There are plenty of twists along the way, and by the end of the novel I was completely hooked. Freeman gets top marks for character development, too. I am waiting impatiently for book two.