The Sacred Stones: A Novel of the First Americans 
asked by maxwell on November 14, 2006 2:40 PM
Courageous, passionate men and women battle for survival of their clans--in the shadow of the great mammoth who speaks with thunder....
As the massive glaciers fade and the wide seas rise, the warm grasslands of the Americas bring prosperity to the gentle People of the Red World, followers of the Great Ghost Spirit, the White Mammoth. But farther north, where the harsh dry winds howl, another nation, the People of the Watching Star, are enmeshed with legends of an evil shaman and the man-eating monster called the wanawut. Relentlessly they have hunted the mammoth to near extinction. Now, as raiders and ravagers they are coming south to invade the villages of the People of the Red World. The only ones who can prevent the murder of innocents and the final slaughter of the mammoth are a young boy shaman to whom the animals speak, a man whose strength equals his conviction, and a woman who hopes that, beyond violence and cruelty, humankind will recognize a stronger power--the force of love.
As the massive glaciers fade and the wide seas rise, the warm grasslands of the Americas bring prosperity to the gentle People of the Red World, followers of the Great Ghost Spirit, the White Mammoth. But farther north, where the harsh dry winds howl, another nation, the People of the Watching Star, are enmeshed with legends of an evil shaman and the man-eating monster called the wanawut. Relentlessly they have hunted the mammoth to near extinction. Now, as raiders and ravagers they are coming south to invade the villages of the People of the Red World. The only ones who can prevent the murder of innocents and the final slaughter of the mammoth are a young boy shaman to whom the animals speak, a man whose strength equals his conviction, and a woman who hopes that, beyond violence and cruelty, humankind will recognize a stronger power--the force of love.
Reviews
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William Sarabande is the gore-master of the ancient people series. He occasionally rises to descriptive eloquence, and he very occasionally tries to describe ancient cooking and housekeeping methods, like Jean Auel does (but much better). But the overriding thing that I hate about Sarabande is the unrelenting blood! Horrific killings, sacrifices of virgins, tortures, delayed deaths, yuck. I know that some Native Americans practiced horrific killings (I hated "Dances with Wolves" too!) But this is not entertainment for me. It is horror, like watching Gremlins or reading a Stephen King novel. I also felt that the religious themes of this novel were too advanced, too close to what we know, to sound authentic. For example, Ysuna will gain life everlasting if she eats of the white mammoth. Is this something that true Native Americans believed? I don't know. It just sounded suspiciously like Western thought (or Middle Eastern blood atonement religions.)
I read this book because I liked a previous one where Navakh was almost a real character, and even his moment of death was described quite interestingly. But even that novel was real bloody. I shouldn't have thought Sarabande would change. Sorry.
I read this book because I liked a previous one where Navakh was almost a real character, and even his moment of death was described quite interestingly. But even that novel was real bloody. I shouldn't have thought Sarabande would change. Sorry.
reviewed by reviewer on November 20, 2006 2:45 PM
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I'm disturbed by the rave reviews this book is getting from the other reviewers on this and other sites; I'm reading this entire series, recommended to me by a trusted friend as something terrifically *bad*, out of something akin to horrified fascination with the idea that this is what sells, this is what people are reading. I worry about the human race; Sarabande's characters are flat and uninteresting, unrealistically motivated, speak and think with identical voices ... the only reason we know their personalities are different from each other's is because the author goes out of the way to *describe* those personalities to us. The author slept through those introductory English classes where the professors beat "show, not tell!" into your head with a two-by-four. The bizarre leap from one set of characters and time period to another, possibly an attempt to start over with a clean slate, didn't bother me after the initial moments of "guh? What just happened here?" but the religious reverence with which Torka and Lonit were held in this book was enough to make me gag (although it *does* remind me a bit of the strange reverenge Sarabande is paid by his fans on these websites). The action proceeds at a good clip, and there are *moments* in the book that approach dramatic or fascinating, but there are so many botched attempts, moments of outright stupidity, and agonizing attempts at character development that fall so short of the mark it's almost comical that this is a book (and a series) I cannot respect.
Read the phone book instead! It may not be as engaging, but it will probably broaden your horizons!
reviewed by redsink on November 24, 2006 10:49 AM