The Wretched of Muirwood by Jeff Wheeler

As much as I wanted to love the story, I was never fully carried away. So that’s not why the book is only a tepid three stars. Rather, I think he’s more of the Tolkien school, where the Catholicity of the author comes out to the discerning reader, but never smacks people over the head. In that sense, I don’t think that his books are Mormon allegories (like Narnia is most definitely a Christian allegory). I think his faith just spills out in his fiction, because it can’t not spill out him. Wheeler intentionally using his story to preach his faith to others? I don’t think so. So when I found out that Jeff Wheeler is a bishop in the LDS church, that explained a lot to me.

I have to say that, as a former seminarian, I’m pretty well versed in the religions of the world.

The Medium, in particular, (the “Force” in this world) was acting in ways that made me squirmy. That there was more to all this than merely a fantasy story. The magic system (“a fantasy version of the Force”) was interesting, and the opening action scene (featuring a huge stone hanging in midair) left me breathless.īut halfway through the book, I got this odd feeling that I was missing something. It reminded me of the first chapters of Anthony Ryan’s Blood Song, but with a compelling female lead. So I came into this series with every intention of loving it. I was intrigued by his “clean fantasy” branding (honestly, I’m a bit over grimdark), and an interview he did in “hostile territory” at the Grim Tidings Podcast showed him to be an intelligent, interesting man. I recently found Jeff Wheeler completely by accident when Amazon was doing a promotional push of his new Kingfountain series.

The Wretched of Muirwood by Jeff Wheeler