The blurb for this book was just an excerpt from one of the most important scenes in this tale. It described the main character, Rune, playing her fiddle for the Ghost of Skull Hill. This is also the image on the cover. I was hooked.
Mercedes Lackey is a master writer with over 140 published novels, and the quality of her stories are reliable. This novel tells the story of a fourteen-year-old girl named Rune who is the illegitimate daughter of a tavern wench. Rune struggles to learn the fiddle with the help of passing minstrel who stay at the tavern on their way through town. The iconic scene in which she plays for the ghost because of a dare happens early in the book and is the turning point in which Rune runs away to try to become a Bard. She doesn’t know that women are not allowed in the Bard guild and has many adventures before she finds her path in life.
The story is fascinating and interesting all the way through. My only gripe and why I can’t give this book five stars on Amazon or Goodreads is the arbitrary inconsistency of Rune’s morals. I don’t expect non-Christian books to have Christian morals, so I don’t judge this book according to that. The problem is that at the beginning of the book, one of Rune’s motivations in running away is to not be like her mother and to protect herself from the boys in the village who want to rape her. Then it is mentioned in passing that she is deflowered by a passing character we hear of twice who actually has a crush on another character. The two of them are friends and come together with no expectations and leave as friends. Why? Just because? When Rune meets her main love interest, she then only has the desire to sleep with him. I am more convinced that he is in love with her than she with him. They sleep together just to marry later. This creates an emotionally dissatisfying love story, and I am left wondering if she will end up just sleeping with someone else after they are married.
The love story is not the main part of this novel, so this gripe is not enough to diminish the fun of the adventures. There isn’t one plot to this novel. It is entirely a character-based story that goes from one adventure to another. The only strangeness is how Mercedes Lackey has focused exclusively on Rune’s point of view for most of the book and then starts seeing the world through her love interests point of view periodically from halfway through the book on. It takes away from this being Rune’s story.
Overall, the story was exciting and enjoyable. The world was full, and the magic was just enough to keep you guessing. The sex is stated or implied without a full description. There is minimal cussing. There is little violence or fighting. I would recommend this book to older teens and adults who are not too sensitive to secular morals.
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What do you think?