The Cloud Roads: Volume One of the Books of the Raksura

I had never read anything by this author before, so I was pleasantly surprised by the book. I don't like to write reviews that give away the plot, so instead I'll just talk about why this book made such a good impression on me, and the one thing that bothered me. The Cloud Roads is that curious beast, a book that defies genre labels. Mind you, I'm not saying it transcends its genre. I hate that phrase, because it implies that genre is a bad thing, and I have no problem with genre.The Cloud Roads is impressive because it mixes genres in an interesting way. The book is set on a world called the Three Kingdoms that doesn't appear to be our own earth. The many and varied humanoid and non-humanoid species on it are clearly alien-- not elves or fairies or dwarves or any other mythical creatures from assorted folklores. No, they are true aliens, and not Star Trek putty-on-their-noses aliens, but beings in a world where a single " species" can have many forms.The protagonist is named Moon. When the story begins, he doesn't even know what kind of creature he is, because he has never met any others like himself since he was quite young. The Three Kingdoms are inhabited by groundlings (creatures who walk), skylings (fly), and sea creatures (swim/live in the water). Moon has two forms, groundling and skyling, and can shift between them. There is no science in this shifting, as there is in Joe Haldeman's Camouflage. The change is clearly accomplished with magic, like the augery and a few other features of this world. For one thing, in one form Moon wears clothes and in the other not, and Wells accounts for this by mentioning that he had to learn to do that magic as well as the magic of changing his body.Eventually, Moon meets several Raksura, other creature with two forms who can shape-shift at will. But the Raksura's alien-ness is not limited to shape shifting and the oddness (wings, scales, tails) of their bodies. No, their species has two main classes of beings, one of which is winged when shifted and the other not. In addition, not all Raksura are fertile. They live in communal "courts" where they are dominated by a reigning queen, a specific variant of Raksura, who is fertile. Queens mate with consorts, and while both are large fierce fighters with a full compliment of wings, scales, and claws, queens are pretty damn scary fighters.Queens fight over consorts, and mark their mates with a scent, so that other queens will leave them alone. But not all females are queens. It's not that they don't have gender roles, it's that they have multiple roles for each gender. The Raksura may be humanoid, but they are not human. Thus, Raksura relationships do not always occur in tidy pairs, and the concept of family is pretty much indistinguishable from community.The bad guys are called the Fell, and they also shape shift and fall into multiple categories of beings, with the smarter "rulers" controlling the dumber varieties. They are impressively evil in that they exist only to prey on other species, which they do quite literally by eating their victims.If I have any complaints with the book, they are mostly about how creatures are named. Raksura is a perfectly fine term, but the two categories of Raksura are Arbora, who are teachers and mentors and whose alternate form is wingless, and Aeriat, who do have wings in their shifted (or non-groundling) form. Why, after building such a wonderfully rich and totally alien setting Wells chose two names that sound and look like English words for tree-related and air-related I will never know. They grated on me, pulling me back from her magical otherworld into the everyday, and I resented that because she did such a good job on everything else. Even calling the bad guys "the Fell" struck me as misguided. No other species had a particularly apt English adjective as a name.I wanted more consistency and logic than I got in naming; even the three main categories of Fell annoyed me: rulers (smart ones), major kethel (the big but dumb ones), and minor dakti (small but still dumb). Rulers were always called just rulers, but sometimes the others were called simply dakti and kethel and sometimes they were major kethel and minor dakti. I kept waiting for a major dakti and a minor kethel to appear but they never did. If they only came in one variety each, then why did they need the major/minor distinction? It made no sense!Of course, I am legendary in my critique group for compaining about characters' names, so it's not surprising this was the one thing that bothered me. I was even bothered by a language being called Altanic because I read it as Atlantic for the first six times I came to it.But, nit picks aside, the story itself is wonderfully told. Moon is a great protagonist; damaged, prickly, but still soft-hearted, Moon hopes for good from the world but so often encounters bad. Wells does a good job of sketching secondary and tertiary characters in just a few sentences, so that the other "people" all feel real. The story has a good mix of action, dialog, and Moon's thought processes. The story is told from Moon's point of view, in third person so close and consistent you could change all the pronouns to make it first person with almost no re-writing. The flying scenes are particularly well done.In short, I loved it!Caveat for Kindle owners: The Kindle version has some bad formatting-- several instances of missing spaces between words and some funky paragraphs. It's not horrible, but I wish they had proofed the ebook layout.

The Cloud Roads is an imaginative experience that surely stands out from its fellow fantasy novels. At the heart of the book is the tale of a character trying to find his place in life, but around him is a setting that is profoundly different from anything in the real world. It is a place inhabited by strange humanoids, flying islands, and a nefarious race of flying creatures called the Fell. Most of the inhabitants can fly, some can shapeshift, but the one thing they all have in common is that none of them are normal.The book stars Moon, a shapeshifter whose family died when he was young. He doesn't know what kind of creature he is, and he's never met another member of his own kind. Living with groundlings (people who do not have wings), he tries to fit in, but it never works. Yet his life changes when he meets Stone, a shapeshifter like him. Stone tells Moon what he is, where his people can be found, and about their way of life. This new knowledge begins to spark a kernel of hope in Moon that he might finally find his place in life.The story is interesting in that it has a slow, steady pace throughout that remains engaging and entertaining. It's not exactly a page turner in that you can't put it down, but it's one of those books you have to come back to. The world Martha Wells creates is pure food for the imagination. This is partly because it is so unlike any other. There are floating islands in the sky, kingdoms on or under the sea, and no familiar land masses or cities. The people come in all colors. Many of them have unique features like tails, tusks, scales, or wings. The one thing there is none of is humans. A lot of the fun in the story is the exploration of this world and its inhabitants. The other half of the fun is Moon's journey.The action in the book is centered on the conflict between everyone and the Fell. The Fell are a race of creatures that destroy everything they encounter. Like ancient Rome, they do not invent their own things, but take from others. They come in several different types: dakti, kethel, and rulers. They all have wings and they're all destructive. If one of their kind dies in combat, they won't hesitate to consume the corpse. The more powerful Fell can even influence other races' minds. Through the story, Moon learns that the Fell are threatening his people. If he wants to find his place in the world, he'll have to fight for it.I loved the inventiveness of the book and how fresh it was from typical fantasy. There isn't much that is normal about the story. I also liked how the tone of the story stayed mellow. It wasn't a dark tale or a lighthearted, happy story. Instead it was somewhere pleasantly in the middle. The characters were fully fleshed out, believable, and realistic in their decision making and actions. Moon's adventure was also thoroughly enjoyable. Best of all the ending was not a cliffhanger. It was substantial enough that the reader can stop right there. Of course there are two more books in the series, so if the reader wants to continue he journey, the option is available. If you're tired of elves, dwarves, orcs, and humans, then The Cloud Roads is definitely a fantasy story worth checking out.

I enjoyed this book very much, but perhaps not as much as the other two Martha Wells books I've read (City of Bones and Death of the Necromancer). Wells is incredibly gifted at creating fascinating worlds. The landscapes and creatures in this book (and some of her others) are unique and refreshing--all these vampire stories are feeling overdone--so it was nice to read a book with an entirely new type of creature populating the pages.The creatures in this book mainly involve Raksura and Fell. Both races can shape-shift from a "groundling" form (two arms, two legs, no wings--something like us humans) to a flying form (although there are a few that don't have wings). Fell, however, are the evil race--piliaging, killing, stealing, and tainting everything in their path. Obviously, the Fell are the antagonists of this book.Moon is Raksura (he's the one featured on the cover of the book). He grew up with just his mother and siblings and very isolated. He was orphaned when he was very young when his mother and siblings were killed and left without a home or any knowledge of his what he was or where to find others like him. So Moon struggles along trying to fit into groundling settlements, but never with much luck. But before long another Raksura finds him--Stone. Moon agrees to let Stone take him back to Stone's "court" (a Raksura city), but quickly learns there's more to this than he first believed.Moon continues to struggle to fit in, even among his own kind, and learns he knows very little about Raksura. He quickly learns part of the reason he was brought back was to help breed more Raksura. The court is failing for some inexplicable reason, the babies dying, and very few males are left to breed with the queens. Thus, Moon learns that the court is failing and the Fell quickly identify themselves as a looming threat. They must deal with the Fell, but their plan is dangerous and puts them in a vulnerable position. Will Moon find a home with the Raksura? Will the mystery of what is causing the court to die be revealed? Will the Fell attack and if so will the Raksura be able to defend? And will Moon mate with either of the queens or find love with one of them? It is these struggles that are the main plot of the book.Wells does well at keeping mystery in the story right to the end and produces several surprises throughout the book. It was well written, attention grabbing, unique, and intriguing. Although I struggle at times to fully visualize Wells' descriptions, I always love what I finally do visualize and I applaud her for keeping my attention and my imagination captured so wonderfully! I highly recommend any and all of Wells' books--even the ones I haven't read yet, I have every confidence they are all fantastic!

THE CLOUD ROADS was cozy and charming, with a surly but lovable dragon-shifter protagonist, Moon. The author, Martha Wells, describes the Three Worlds like the author of a particularly luscious travel guide, full of shores, forests, and cities that you can't help but want to visit. I felt immersed in the world and connected to Moon, who I rooted for, and Wells does a wonderful job of dropping the reader into various social groups without letting the new people or customs become confusing or overwhelming.In THE CLOUD ROADS Moon finds himself among his own people, the Raksura, after a life of fruitless searching. He's tried to fit in with many different people over the years, but once they find out that he's a shifter - and resembles a race of rapacious predators, the Fell - they always kick him out. He's nearly too exhausted to try again, now that he's been found by his own kind, especially since years of bad luck have all the Raksura of Indigo Cloud feeling uncharitable and on edge. There's lots of tension boiling under the surface and, because of who and what Moon is, his presence sparks a fair bit of conflict.The story kept me interested but the relationships between the main characters never quite gelled. Moon develops a friendship with another dragon-shifter, Chime, who has a pretty interesting backstory but never quite came to life. Moon's romantic relationship with Jade, the young queen, develops naturally but I never felt a spark. And so on and so forth with the other secondary characters; almost there, but not quite.This is really a 3.5 star book. When I'm conflicted, my rule is to round up if I think I'd read another book by the author or down if I don't. I'm not sure; I don't think I'll seek out the sequel to THE CLOUD ROADS, but I wouldn't avoid it, either. On the other hand, you never know. I picked this one up because I'd just finished a book that was really intense and gritty and I wanted something that would keep me glued to the page without sawing at my heartstrings, and this fit the bill perfectly. I guess I'll round up - a book deserves a little boost for offering the right thing at the right time.EDITED TO ADD: I had a chance to read the sequel, THE SERPENT SEA, and I LOVED it. I'm glad in retrospect that I gave THE CLOUD ROADS four stars - I like where this series is going & suspect I wasn't in the right mood to appreciate THE CLOUD ROADS when I read it.

I am yawning my idiot head off this morning because I was up until an ungodly hour finishing this. I didn't realize the book had that kind of hold on me, until I found myself turning the last page at 2 am and wishing it wasn't over yet. Happily, it's the first of a trilogy. Sadly, the second and third books aren't out yet.I'm not really sure how to describe it. It's a fantasy novel, but it's really different. Actually, the atmosphere and writing style kind of remind me of Ursula K. Leguin, in a weird way. But while Leguin has a lovely, spare style that has a lot of mental space in it, her actual characters often leave me a bit cold. Martha's characters aren't like that at all - I really, really connected with them. This morning, I find I actually miss them!On the surface, it's kind of about dragon people. But it's not a human world into which dragon-like beings have been inserted - it's a really alien world with a really alien landscape, and all of the people in it are alien, except for how they feel so real and warm and familiar. There's nothing traditional about the fantasy here, or the style of magic, or the races of the people in the story, which just makes it that more absorbing. The character voices and personalities are interesting and distinct, and the story is just... I don't know, it's sort of scary and weird and interesting and oddly sweet, all at once. The bad guys are... really freakishly scary bad, and yet not in a way that's external to the world they're set in, if that makes sense.So, um, the story itself... I don't want to spoil anybody because I want everybody to read it, but it's the story of Moon, who was raised without knowing who or what he was, and who has lived his entire life with "groundlings", hiding his true nature, always alone and an outsider. He's discovered by an elder of his race, who takes him back to his people; the external plot is about how he tries to help save them from the Fell, a race like his but vicious and destructive. The internal, emotional plot is about how someone who's always been an outcast and a stranger everywhere he goes tries to adjust to a not-always-friendly, sometimes too-friendly clan and become one of them. It's about his friendships and relationships - which I think will resonate a LOT with most readers - as much as about what happens to him and his people.It's something new and different, and at the same time it has the emotional resonance fans tend to thrive on. And it is complete in and of itself, even though it begins a trilogy - you don't get cliffhangered, so it's safe to start. And it made me really happy! The Cloud RoadsThe Cloud Roads