Review: The Human Familiar by Honor Raconteur

The Human Familiar by Honor Raconteur
Familiar and the Mage #1

Publishing Date: September 28th, 2017

My Rating: 2.5/5 - very magical, with an ambling plot and a writing style I just couldn't grow to like

On Goodreads




I'm over a year late to this book, but to be fair, I first came across it about a week ago. With a 4.32 rating average on Goodreads at the time of writing this post, you'd expect I'd have at least heard of it before. But no, if not for my kindle unlimited subscription, it would probably have continued to pass me by.



The main (and POV) characters are Bannen and Rena, a 19-year-old, accomplished fighter and a 16-year-old, rather unusual mage-in-training. Drawn together by a familiar bond, they have to battle politics, a mysterious monster, assassins, more politics, and Rena's health, not necessarily in that order.

If that sounds like a bit of a mish-mashed plot in the making to you, I'd have to agree. Even with the many different problems Rena and Bannen faced in the course of the book, I found myself wishing for the book to finally get to the point. The whole plot had an ambling quality to it that I just didn't appreciate - I still don't quite know what the climax of the book should have been. There were a number of small ones, but not one of them stood out to me in a major way, leaving me slightly unsatisfied with the book after finishing it.

"This is not," I said around a dry mouth, "the adventure I signed up for."

Same, Bannen, same.

Actually, that quote brings me to the next point: Bannen. For a 19-year-old, he's strangely good at everything, knows everything, can read everyone. He's supposed to be perceptive, but his skills are ridiculous. He's constantly arguing with people with years more experience in areas than him - and winning. He's supposed to be a fighter above everything else, yet runs circles around judges. Combat situation? Everyone else is idiots, he knows better. Either the other people in this novel are all conveniently incompetent, or Bannen is just aggravatingly good at everything, and neither of those makes for interesting reading.

"Even in crowded, convoluted streets like this, I don't ever get lost."

We get it, Bannen. You're great at everything.

Which leads me to the next problem I had with the book. The writing style. Most of the information about characters and even the worldbuilding comes from dialogues. They're information dumps throughout a lot of the book. We get told about character traits we never really see, either in dialogue or in internal monologues.

"I had more thinking to do, and since I'm an active thinker, I kept walking."

Sort of like that. This leads to some awkward sentences, and repetitive information, as well as characters stating the obvious. The telling extends to situations as well, by which point I was just trying to get through this book.

The utter failure of show-don't-tell aside, there are so. Many. Hypothetical questions and questions in dialogue that are answered "off-screen". It made for choppy, stiff conversations, and a bit painful reading.

"Bannen, you ready? Good, then let's tackle it."

...oh, please let's not.

With all of that, why does the book still have 2.5/5 stars for me? Well, I still enjoyed parts of it. If it had been any longer, I might not have finished it, but as it was, I could overlook the problems I had with the book because the worldbuilding is truly interesting and Rena's magic especially so. Does that mean I'll pick up the second book? Eh, probably not.