Beyond the Gloaming by Brendan Murphy
Rating: 4 stars
I have received this book by the author in exchange for my honest review.
I first want to start off saying, I deeply apologize for it taking so long to get this review. Between traveling for Christmas, my internship, homework, work, and the flu, I have lacked any reviews. But! I am done with my internship and now have some free time to do those things I enjoy!
Beyond the Gloaming is about a boy named Sebastian who is a very lucid dreamer, only his dreams are real and he doesn’t often remember them or are able to interact with them, until the day two school bullies nearly kill him. His body puts him into a comatose state in order to protect him, that state is where the story takes place.
Sebastian is Irish currently living in England. Sometimes the words are hard to understand because the author is writing with a strong Irish dialect, which comes across the way it supposed to, but hard to understand (for me anyways). Sebastian’s older brother died, and his mom appears to be bipolar and goes from ignoring him, to beating him. When his mother is in one of her moods, dad usually punishes Sebastian as they blame him for the swings.
During his comatose state, Sebastian is transported to the Gloaming, a shadow world, an in-between, a dreamworld. Here he meets Porrig, a creepy little creature that Sebastian is forced into trusting blindly. Sebastian is special, and he is to be delivered to the King of Hibercadia in hopes to save Hibercadia from Phobitor, one of the gods from another dreamworld. Phobitor sends many to try and destroy young Sebastian before he can reach the item he is searching for.
This is a coming of age tale, in a way. Sebastian, who is weak, and feeble, who has no self confidence, and written to save an entire world he didn’t even know existed. Sebastian learns much about himself throughout his journey, finding smarts he didn’t know he had. This story is filled with excitement, adventure, and betrayal. Murphy is a great world builder, but sometimes I would get lost and have to reread.
One of my issues I had with this book is the terminology. It has a lot of Gaelic, which I am unfamiliar with. I have had to google words such as, sgian dubhs, which I had no clue what they were. I did discover there is a glossary in the back, however, I found out at the end of the book, and I had a PDF copy, so it would not have helped me. For me, if I do not always understand what is being said, and have to reread portions, I get really lost and start to lose interest. I do recommend this book, however, I would read a physical copy so you can access the glossary in the back. For other words not included, I would have your phone at the ready to google, which is what I had to do often.
Overall, I did enjoy the book and would read more of Murphy’s work. I am however, not certain I will continue with this specific series because of my difficulty with the language used. I still gave the book 4 stars however for it’s originality, and because I still did like the book.
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