The Crescent Stone

The Crescent Stone *****
by Matt Mikalatos

 Overview: A teenage girl is dying. A man from another world invites her to come and fight his fantasy land's enemies for one year. In exchange, she will be completely healed. She enters into this agreement unaware of the full extent of it. In this new land, she finds that it isn't always easy to distinguish who your enemies really are.

Positive elements: The book is well-written. I loved that I didn't have any idea of how it was going to end. It's also perfectly clean.

Negative elements: The book's only downside was that it was a bit preachy. The author wanted kids to think about race and how it has played out in our country's past and how we need to view people of other races today as well. It's a good message, but the "teaching" was a bit unnatural in the story and dragged down the flow of the book.

Conclusion: I would recommend this fantasy book to any age. The characters are teenagers but adults could enjoy the easy-reading story as well. I always have a hard time with current fantasy books because I tend to compare them all to Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, and they all fail in that comparison.

I received this book for free from Tyndale and offer this review of my own opinions.