ANTIGUA: The Land of Fairies Wizards and Heroes (Part 1)

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Binding: Paperback EAN: 9781425997823 ISBN: 1425997821 Label: AuthorHouse Manufacturer: AuthorHouse Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 316 Publication Date: 2007-09-27 Publisher: AuthorHouse Studio: AuthorHouse
Editorial Reviews: Antigua: The Land of Fairies, Wizards and Heroes (Part 1) is the first of a trilogy. This story is a fantasy with magical characters such as a Sorceress, a Dragon, Fairies, Wizards, Knights, Kings, Queens, Pixies, and Gnomes. Here is a sample from the book: Suddenly, there were black clouds in the sky. Everyone heard a loud noise coming from the sky and they all knew that Voltar the Dragon was coming. King Artor yelled out, "Daughters, Voltar comes! Get ready your weapons! The time has come for you to fulfill the prophecy!" Princess Sasha, Princess Trina, Princess Alexandra and Rebecca walked up ahead of the army and lined up together in a row. They looked like warriors! Rebecca was not afraid! She took a deep breath and got her weapon ready for the task that lay ahead. She understood the prophecy now and had faith in herself and the Princesses. They each pulled out their bows and prepared to kill the dragon. Fire came out of his nostrils and his mouth. Princess Alexandra handed each of the other girls one of the special arrows that they had gotten from the Queen of the Unicorns. All four of the girls pointed their bows up into the air and waited for Voltar to come nearer. Voltar let out such a loud noise that the ground shook! Then fire came right out of his nostrils. The Wizard Thandor held his mighty wand up toward the sky and yelled, "Mighty clouds of the sky, I call upon you to bring forth lightening to destroy the Dragon Voltar!" Large lightening bolts came out of the clouds toward Voltar. One lightening bolt struck Voltar and wounded him, but it didn't kill him!
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Very nice fantasy book, good reading! Comment: I must say, I really liked the book Antigua. For a first time Author, you really have vivid imagination. I imagined the underwater world as I was reading it and pictured the characters also. The story line and plot was fascinating and you should continue in your effort to publish part 2 and 3. I have read both positive and negative reviews and as you know both can be a learning experience. I didn't concentrate on the typographical errors as there is so much more to this book that will be missed if one only focused on the slight imperfections in the preparation. I am an avid reader and know it takes courage to venture out and actually see your dream become a reality in publishing a novel. Kudos to you Mrs. Ellis! Stay encouraged and thank all reviewers for their comments and please bless us with the continuation of your trilogy, as i'm sure the next two will be even more fascinating! I will definately buy them and continue to support you. Customer Rating: Summary: A more than decent first attempt at a children's book. Comment: I'm normally skeptical when I see books that have only 1-star reviews, as I think virtually nothing can be THAT bad, but this one made me curious. My cousins love the genre of fantasy, and I've read to them (both of them are girls) from Paolini and Rowling before to great success. I thought I would try something different, however, and this book seemed a great place to take a chance. I can honestly say after reading it that it's really not -as- bad as the previous reviewers make it seem. My cousins certainly enjoy it, and their ages are 11 and 13. It is a wonderful story that is more than capable of enticing children who listen to it, and it reminds me very much of the things my mother used to read to me when I was little. Those who mentioned the excessive exclamation points as a problem: Yes, that's true, but I have a feeling you only read the first page or so (or probably even just the description given here on the Amazon page), because it becomes more normalized very quickly. I second most people's opinions that it is unethical to review your own book, but it is almost as unethical to review a book YOU HAVE NOT BOUGHT AND READ, so keep that in mind. Also, and I can't stress this enough, you are reviewing a -children's- book. You cannot read Antigua and approach it as though you are reading Hawthorne or Shakespeare. I also do not think it is condescending to refer to a children's book as what it is: A book for children/kids. I don't find that disrespectful, I just find it to be true. Those who study literature (like myself, I'm currently studying for a Master's in English Education) should know very well how different the style must be for a younger audience. We needn't critique societal and religious hypocrisy as Hawthorne does, or imperialism and gender roles as Shakespeare does, in children's literature. This is because, for the most part, children A) Just want to hear good stories, and B) Have not yet developed the critical thinking skills to analyze literature on a professional level; for them, heaped symbolism and complicated prose is just confusing and... well, boring. Keep in mind that if you gave a young child a copy of Shakespeare's "Othello" and told them to read it, you would probably turn them off of literature for the rest of their lives. It's not insulting or demeaning to their intelligence. Rather, I find it more insulting to adult intelligence, since some here seem to think that young teen and pre-teen children tend to be just as wise/intelligent as the average adult. I like to think I've gotten a bit smarter than that in the last ten years, personally. Education helps. Now, I do have one other complaint. Chapter breaks would be very helpful. In children's literature, normally you will have a grown-up readign the book to them, so it's extremely helpful to have a definite place to stop reading for the night. I had quite a hard time determing where to stop when I was reading this as a bedtime story as a result! This is, however, a minor gripe, like the exclamation point one. Someone who reads to children as much as I do will surely be able to figure out a good place to stop reading for the night. As for the story itself, I would be fascinated by it if I were still a child; it has all the proper elements of fantasy without delving into cliche or stereotype, and it rarely becomes tedious or boring. Overall, I and my cousins thank you for writign this book. We're very much enjoying it! I don't want to ruin too much of the plot for perspective buyers, but... currently, the troupe of heroes is marching on Gwendeviere and Voltrarr's northernmost province, and William has very cutely given Rebecca his jacket to keep her warm. I decided a good place to stop last time was with the brief synpsosis of each province shortly thereafter, and I and my cousins can't wait to find out what happens from there! So, in summation, to Larry and Denise: Don't give up, and certainly don't let some bad reviews dissuade you! I'm positive there are others out there, such as myself, who are genuinely enjoying your book and look forward to the sequels. Few things in the world are as magical as fiction writing (except maybe the land of Antigua!), and while we are all entitled to voicing our own opinions, we should never quit those magical things that we love and find meaning in. Looking forward to the end of part 1, and the beginning of part 2! Customer Rating: Summary: Not Even Funny Comment: This book, in short, is abominable. If I'm being honest, I bought it because it looked hilariously bad. It WAS horrendous - so much so, in fact, that I couldn't even get a laugh out of it. It's very near unintelligible in places, and rather than providing amusement (of the intended kind or otherwise), it made me quite sick to my stomach. 'Antigua: The Land of Fairies Wizards and Heroes' is a disgrace to the English language and to the world of literature. Let me stress again: IT ISN'T FUNNY. I cracked up reading the excerpt from 'Search Inside the Book', but beyond that, it's too long and falls completely flat. Anyway, after suffering through all 307 pages (in which there are no chapter breaks and only sparing paragraph breaks), I did a little experiment. I gave the book to my younger sister's eleven-year-old friend without comment to see what she thought. We got a call from her the next day, saying, "What is this, a joke? Did some three-year-old write it?" That's actually an exact quote. And that's what I call testing the book in its market. Potential customers: do not let your curiosity lead you to err. Stay far, far away. If you're looking for something amusingly bad, check out Atlanta Nights. That one even has a great story behind its conception. Oh, and one more note. Whoever did the cover design was rather inept - the title and authors' names are absent from the spine. Just another thing that makes this book seem utterly unprofessional. Customer Rating: Summary: A Disgrace to Children's Literature Comment: Children's literature deserves what one might expect from any adult novel - a coherent plot, correct spelling and punctuation, intriguing sentence structure and factual information. This book has failed miserably on all fronts. It was so bad I actually found it laughable (the use of the word "lightening" instead of "lightning", a character takes a train from Britain to England). This author clearly has little respect for child readers. I'm appalled to think that the Ellis's believe this book is acceptable reading material and even more concerned that a child might actually get their hands on a copy. Just say no to Antigua! Customer Rating: Summary: The Worst. Comment: Not only is this book poorly edited, lacking mature character development and starving for originality, but the author wrote her own five star review. How insulting is that? Fortunately, I flipped through the book before giving it to my daughter. Had I given her this title for her birthday, I could have turned her off to reading for life - and to birthdays. I was content to write it off as a loss, but the author drove me to stating my outrage publicly. She's been rude to authors who offered advice. In addition to reviewing her own title, she is guilty of spamming advertisements for her book all over the Amazon forums, no matter how inappropriate the category. Want a book on refinishing tables? Buy Antigua. Cat need box trained? Buy Antigua. On a final note, I was tempted to write this entire review in small letters only. Thanks to the author the planet is running dangerously low on capital letters and we are already completely out of explanation points. How will there ever be a trilogy without them? Do not encourage this author's behavior. Encourage her to learn and improve by not buying this book. More Reviews