Blog Tour: The Flight of the Griffin by C.M. Gray

The Flight of the Griffin by C.M. Gray

Series: The Flight of the Griffin, #1
Release Date: June 25th 2012
Publisher:  lulu
Format: Paperback
Pages: 253
Genre: Young Adult - Fantasy
Source: Author/Publisher
Author: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads
Buy it: Amazon | The Book Depository
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The Kingdom is dying…

The Darkness is coming… the balance between Order and Chaos is rapidly shifting and the world is falling towards evil and horror, and all misery that Chaos will bring.

But there is hope…

Pardigan’s had enough, he’s only 12, but he’s breaking into the home of one of Freya's richest merchants... and he’s doing it tonight…

A burglary that will change their lives forever sets four friends upon a quest, a race against time, to locate three magical objects and complete an ancient and desperate spell.

Sailing their boat The Griffin, the crew are quickly pursued by The Hawk, an evil bounty hunter and master of dark sorcery, and Belial, King of Demons and champion of Chaos who seeks to rule the world of man… yet first he must capture the crew of The Griffin and end their quest…

I can’t honestly say that I had no expectations going into this book. I am not a big fantasy reader. I never finished Harry Potter if that tells you anything. The premise of this book sounds really good though so I really wanted to try it anyway. This book went way beyond my expectations! Now because I had none you would say that’s not that big of a deal but it is.. This book was really good!

This book follows around a group of kids, Pardigan, Quint, Loras, and Taint. They live by themselves on a boat named The Griffin. They all came by each other on random occasions and were the closest thing to family any of them have had. At the start of the book, one of the young kids, Pardigan, is in the process of stealing from a merchant in town. However, little does he know the magnitude of what he has stolen from the man.

This one act leads them on a quest none of them could ever have imagined. With Mahra, a girl who can transform into an owl, a cat, and a panther, as their guide, they encounter wizards, demons, and even the King of Demons himself. All the while trying to outrun a Human hunter nicknamed, The Hawk, and the fat old merchant. The boys become the Magician, Thief, Priest, and Fighter. This is a story about a race against time and the battle between Order and Chaos.

There are multiple points of view in this book. However, you do not get the point of view until you meet the character. I really liked this because you didn’t know who you were going to meet. You get a point of view from at least a couple of the kids and about three other people. There was a switch in point of view multiple times in a chapter but it never got confusing and it was very helpful in pushing the story along. I was never bored during the story and I always was wanting to know what was going to happen next.

I thought it was a little strange that a child was able to best the king of demons with almost no problem at all. However, even the King of Demons himself said that so obviously that was the way it should have been. I had to keep reminding myself that the boys possessed powers that were enhanced and that was why they could act the way they did. Other than that I saw no problems with the book.

This book is written in British English so there were a few alternate spelling and different names for some things; However, I still enjoyed the writing style. I really enjoyed the plot of the book and fully intend on reading the second book in the series! I would recommend this to anyone that likes young adult fantasy adventure stories.

Come back tomorrow (12/13/13) for a first chapter preview!

My Rating:

*This book was provided for free in exchange for an honest review. 

{About the Author}

Born in England, C.M. Gray spent most of his youth growing up in the Essex countryside. A beautiful part of England, close to the Suffolk border, but he was born with the need to expand his horizons, so as soon as he could get a passport at the age of just seventeen he packed a backpack and went exploring!

A slightly risky decision, and one his parents were not too taken with, yet a number of years later he is still traveling…. but with a slightly larger bag. Over the years, C.M.Gray has been lucky enough to live and travel in many many parts of the world, met some incredible people and experienced some amazing places. In fact, he has now lived for more years outside of England than he ever spent living there – It is, after all, a very big and exciting world!

During his journey he worked and trained as a carpenter and a house restorer… picked more types of fruit over the years than he knew existed - from grapes in France to avocados in Israel. After living in Israel for a year, he was lucky enough to be invited to travel with the Bedouin in the Sanai desert for several months and then moved on travelled around India and then called a Buddhist monastery in the Himalayan Mountains home. A short while later he had changed tact, bought a suit and did a stint as a stock broker in the clamor of central Hong Kong.

To celebrate the millennium he traveled back to Europe, then found and restored an old farmhouse in deep rural Burgundy, France… but then looked to the open road and spent an number of years in Amsterdam… but the winters were cold so he went south again in search of the sun.

Always vowing to return and sink some roots back in English soil... he hasn’t quite got there yet, but maybe someday, it seems there are just too many interesting places out there to see first! He does, however, live a little closer to England now, just outside of Barcelona in Northern Spain, in the middle of the forest with his dogs and two wonderful children, he claims the Pyrenean mountains and forests of northern Spain are a great place to write and let his mind do the traveling.

As you will have noticed, his writing is mostly fantasy and he says that many of his experiences in Asia, India, Africa and the Middle East come to life in his writing. He has seen and done some pretty strange things on his travels, and bumped into some amazing characters, so writing fantasy is almost like writing fact for him… you just wouldn’t believe it if he presented it as fact – there are people and things out there in this world of ours that would simply amaze you!