What is SPFBO 9?  This is  a competition where authors of self-published fantasy can enter their work. The objective to find a winner out of the 300 entries submitted.  Ten judges (or judging teams) each receive 30 entrants.  Each judge/team will eventually submit one finalist to the second round where a winner will eventually be decided upon. Check out Mark Lawrence’s post here to look at this year’s entrants, judges and allocations list.  Also, check out this page to see all the lovely finalists and the scoreboard for Phase 2 of the competition.

I enjoyed Daughter of the Beast.  It’s an intriguing tale of a young girl taken captive at an early age from her village, family and friends.  It’s a coming of age tale that sees our MC eventually embrace her new way of life making strong friendships along the way.

Zyntael Fairwinter is ten years old when she is taken by the Vulkari and claimed by the matriarch.at first she dreams of escape, even making a gutsy attempt, but as the weeks tick into months and the years roll by she finds herself becoming attached to the characters and their way of life, even embracing the love of raids.

In terms of the plot, well, I was very intrigued to know exactly why Zyntael had been taken by the Vulkari leader, Karthak, as was Zyntael herself.  She is trained as a warrior although her smaller stature holds her back in some respects.  Clearly, Karthak takes her training seriously, leaving her for a time with the Hobgoblins to assist in her knowledge and experience.  Eventually, she returns to these wolf like warrior women and accepted as one of their own, training with other young women who will eventually become her ‘sisters’.

I enjoyed the writing.  The story is told in Stitches – which is relevant as the Vulkari tribe use embroidery as a means to tell their own stories.  Each stitch tells a different part of Zyntael’s story so far.  The pacing is good, it gets off to a bit of a hectic start but then calms down somewhat.  As Zyntael herself lacks any knowledge of the world beyond her village we learn things with her as the story unfolds and I really enjoyed this style of storytelling.  There are no humans in this story but a mix of fae like people, goblins, hobgoblins, obviously the Vulkari warrior women and a few others.  I thought the world building was really good, it doesn’t suffer from being too flowery but just gives you the detail you need in order to create your own picture.  I would also mention, having said this is a coming of age style story that this didn’t feel YA to me, it’s often times a brutal world and there is no shortage of death amongst these pages.

I also liked Zyntael and particularly enjoyed the friendships she makes along the way, especially as this is a slow process which felt more natural somehow.

My only issue with the story is that it felt like it lost focus somehow.  In fact I’m probably not really phrasing that very well. Just that there’s an element of events taking place but I never really got the sense of moving forward and I think I was always conscious of wanting to know more.  To be fair, this is clearly the start of the series and so no doubt these elements will eventually be unravelled.  I just would have liked a bit of a better understanding by the end of the first book.  But, that’s a personal thing at the end of the day.

Overall, I thought this was an intriguing story, I liked the writing and the incorporation of folklore and myth and I would be interested to see where Zyntael’s story leads her next.

I received a copy from the author, for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.

My rating 6.5 of 10 or 3 of 5 for Goodreads