Review: Venator

Venator by James Bubela
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Loren has a deathwish, nothing to lose, and a few people to kill.

Venator was a good book. You can tell from the description that Venator is going to be a dark and grim tale of vengeance, but it also contained bits of humor, some memorable characters, and a good overall plot. The story is about Loren, who believes he’s lost everything and is driven by a deathwish and a quest for revenge. During the book, my favorite technique was the way that Loren’s storytelling was woven into the plot -- as he interacts with various characters, he relives flashbacks from his past as he tells the tale of what took place before the novel begins. I also thought the story had excellent pacing, events moved along at an even pace, quickening at the end as the plot came to a climax and something of a resolution (leaving a nice segue for a sequel).

But Venator also had a few flaws. Most of the supporting cast of characters were either superfluously detailed and quirky or completely flat and uninteresting. A lot of the interactions and dialog felt odd or awkward and some of the characters didn’t behave in believable ways -- even for a fantasy novel. The psychology present wasn’t deep and Loren frequently flipped from seeming perfectly normal to deeply traumatized and psychotic (but maybe that was intentional). The plot did have some twists and turns along the way, but I honestly thought the foreshadowing was a bit overdone and because of that, most twists seemed fairly predictable.

All-in-all, Venator was a good book but due to a few flaws, not a great book. I was torn on the rating between three and four stars, but I’m going to settle on rounding it up. From what I understand, Venator is James Bubela’s first book and its pretty outstanding work for a first novel. Bubela showed great promise with Venator and I really think he’s going to be an author to watch.

For the audiobook, Clint Grayson did a decent job. His performance wasn’t my favorite, but neither did it turn me off from the book. Some characters, such as Loren and a few of the ‘extras’ were great and really made the book come alive. But then some other supporting characters were performed with voices that were odd, annoying, or flat and indistinguishable from others. But I think this is also one of Grayson’s first narrations and I think he has some potential as well. At this point, I wouldn’t pick up a new book just because I see his name as the narrator, but I certainly wouldn’t avoid getting an interesting sounding book just because he’s narrating.

Special thanks to James Bubela, who provided me with this book at my request.

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