A Review of 'The Water Mirror' by Kai Meyer (Audio Book)

"In Venice, magic is not unusual.  Merle is apprenticed to a magic mirror maker, and Serafin-- a boy who was once a master thief-- works for a weaver of magical cloth.  Merle and Serafin are used to the mermaids who live in the canals of the city-- beautiful creatures with hideous mouths that split their faces from ear to ear-- and to the guards who patrol the streets on living stone lions.  Merle herself possesses something magical: a mirror whose surface is water.  She can reach her whole arm into it and never get wet.  But Venice is under siege by the Egyptian Empire; its terrifying mummy warriors and flying sunbarks are waiting to strike.  All that protects the Venetians is the Flowing Queen.  Nobody knows who or what she is-- only that her power flows through the canals and keeps the Egyptians at bay.

When Merle and Serafin overhear a plot to capture the Flowing Queen, they are catapulted into desperate danger.  They must do everything they can to rescue the Queen and save the city-- even if it means getting help from the Ancient Traitor himself.

Kai Meyer's bold, original fantasy conjures up a land of magic and menace as Merle and Serafin begin a journey to unimagined realms in the extraordinary world of Dark Reflections."

This is a book that I listened to over the summer while I was gardening at school.  I can't really decide how I feel about this book.  I know that I wanted to like it-- I mean, what's not to like about mermaids and magic?  But I was really confused when Egypt came in and lots of lions came in as well.  I know that Egypt wants the Flowing Queen, but I don't understand what's in it for them.  I also want to know why Egyptians are the bad guys.  Perhaps I'm missing out on some history or mythology or both, but I can't help but wonder why Egypt was the opposition.

It's been a while since I've listened to this book and I only remember the first half of this book.  I don't think that says good things about the last half of the book.  I'm not just saying that as a cop=out of this blog post either.  Even as I was listening to this book and gardening (which doesn't require a ton of brain power, since I'm not operating heavy machinery), I found myself lost, even when I backed up and re-listened to significant portions of the last half of the book.

This is probably the most pathetic blog post I've written as of late.  This is how I feel about this book now.  I don't know if I'll read this book again... I want to in order to form a more complete opinion of this book, but at the same time, this is part one of the full story.  Life is too short to read books I don't feel very interested in reading (with the exception of books for school, because I want my Bachelor's Degree at some point).  So we'll see what the future brings.

For now, I give 'The Water Mirror' a tentative rating of:

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude