Another excellent read from Slayton, Dark Moon Shallow Sea may have convinced me to fall in love with high fantasy again. David continues to impress, crafting a second fascinating universe full of characters the reader can’t help but connect with and that contains subtle nods to history and religion throughout while remaining firmly the author’s own creation. The surprise twists on standard fantasy tropes only serve to make the story more engaging and to have a queer fantasy wherein homophobia isn’t an issue? Yes, please. Really can’t recommend this one highly enough and hope there’s more to come.

I noped out when the man who told the people chasing them that he was a heretic who worships the moon goddess goes to the goddess’ abandoned temple to hide, saying no one will look for them there.

WHY NOT, RAEF?

WHY WOULDN’T THEY LOOK THERE?

WHY WOULDN’T THAT BE THE FIRST PLACE ON THEIR LIST?

HUH? HUH?? HUH???

So dumb.

Even before that, though… the writing isn’t bad as such, but it’s so plain and basic that it might as well be. It was like being fed a meal of plain porridge; absolutely no flavour, and extremely dispiriting to chew through. Everything was blunt, everything was predictable, the setting is just ‘generic Fantasy City’. There’s no description, and there’s a lot of ridiculous cliches. The dialogue was stiff and stilted; it read like a bad script, just not written in the way real people speak.

I cannot believe everyone continued to call the casket/chest Kinos was in ‘a box’ – I know, that’s probably terribly petty, but it sounded so ridiculously stupid. ‘The man in the box’ ‘when we find him, we’ll put him back in the box’ ‘he needs to go back in the box!’ Dude. No. Please call it something else.

Speaking of calling it something else, I cannot stand when real-world names show up in fantasy worlds. I know Phoebe is a moon-related name, but it is also a name from our world, so if you call your goddess that, I’m going to flinch. Also, Hyperion for a sun god? Really? Come on. You can do better!

Ultimately it was all just so simple and boring. There were definite hints that the plot was going somewhere a bit more complicated – I liked the hounds of fire, I liked that our knight-of-the-sun-god was a misfit, the bishop is Not Stupid for a change – but I had zero interest in finding out what it might be. Simple prose, simple characters, simple worldbuilding. Forcing myself to read through it made me want to claw my own skin off. Hard DNF.

David Slayton is a great Writer and the overall premise is great.

The book has lots of great fantasy elements, of magic, and gods, however it's not really my cup of tea.

I couldn't connect with the characters and the story was a little odd reading. The relationships felt a little forced.

Thanks for the opportunity

Oh, not for me. After the first scene unfolded, I realized that the two male characters were going to be attracted to each other as the story progresses. My interest fizzled out since I don't personally connect this way.


I'd advise to tag additional descriptors in NetGalley.

This was very good. I highly enjoyed this book. It is the start of a new series and I can't wait until the next one comes out. It was very entertaining.
I just reviewed Dark Moon Shallow Sea by David R. Slayton. #DarkMoonShallowSea #NetGalley
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Dark Moon, Shallow Sea is a book I wanted to like more than I did. The premise appealed to me immediately from the blurb, and I did still like the storyline on the whole as I read. But something about the book didn't quite work for me. My attention wandered as I read and the characters never caught me in any kind of emotional connection, their relationships feeling forced. It's hard to pinpoint why exactly I felt that way, and perhaps other readers will really connect with the work, but for me personally it was missing a spark to captivate me and lift the book above a shallow read through. As such, I am giving it three stars. It had promise and there were good elements, but it simply wasn't a stand-out work for me.

This book is well written, haunting, suspenseful, and an all around joy to read. I found the characters to be well rounded and the plot impossible to put down. I read it in one sitting. Will be highly recommending it to all of my patrons. Thank you to Blackstone Publishing via NetGalley for this arc. I voluntarily read it and all opinions are my own.