Sword of Darkness (Lords of Avalon, Book 1)

Despite being a huge fan of Kinley MacGregor's Dark Hunter series (written under the name Sherrilyn Kenyon), I was a little nervous about this book. Fantasy novels about Merlin and Camelot usually disappoint me. However, MacGregor has written a fabulous book with action, intrigue, time-travel, talking gargoyles, and, best of all, humor.

Camelot is no longer the shining beacon of hope it once was and is instead a colorless, evil place where only might is respected. Moran, the fey Queen, rules over Camelot and Kerrigan is her champion. No one can kill Kerrigan as he possesses the sword Caliburn; Caliburn is Excalibur's polar opposite and the wielder of the sword must handle demonic powers.

Gawain and the other good knights from the legendary Camelot now reside in Avalon where they are awaiting the birth of the next Penmerlin, the wizard who will oversee all of the lesser Merlins (Merlin is the name given to a magical advisor rather than one specific person). Seren believes herself to be a simple peasant woman who only wants to rise from apprentice weaver to journeywoman. She is terrified when two of the Lords of Avalon, Gawain and Agravain, surprise her with the news that she will be the mother of the next Penmerlin and that she must go to Avalon with them. She escapes only to be "rescued" by Kerrigan and taken to Camelot. However, Seren sees a spark of good in Kerrigan and teaches him about love and sacrifice. Seren becomes pregnant with Kerrigan's baby and Kerrigan is then forced to choose between the love Seren offers and the evil he is familiar with. How will the Lords of Avalon handle Seren and a child of Kerrigan's? Will Kerrigan choose to overcome his demons and be able to defeat Morgan? MacGregor answers these questions and more- with the added twist of time travel.

Overall, this was a book that I thoroughly enjoyed. I didn't want to put it down as I just had to know what crazy twist MacGregor would think of next! There are some laugh-out-loud moments that really stand out (gargoyles as Star Trek fans for one) but you'll have to read this one for yourself to see what I mean. Highly recommended!

I have enjoyed most of Kinley/Sherrilyn's books but I couldn't even bring myself to finish this book. Great idea but so badly written. Modern slang/gargoyles that talk like Beavis and Butthead/cheesy love scenes/historically based villians that sound like bad Bold and the Beautiful dialogue etc. Kerrigan sounded hot and I loved the cover but the rest was such a disappointment. Quote from chapter 2: "His body fired at the innocence he tasted, at the knowledge that no other man had ever tread upon this mouth before him". I should hope that no other man had ever tread upon her mouth...sheesh.

I am looking forward to the next Dark-Hunter novel, but I will pass on the Lord of Avalon series.

I tried to like this book, but I was barely able to finish it.

The characters were underdeveloped, the plot got lost, and there were some gaping holes in characterization and the world of the books that needed explaining or fixing.

The only bright spots I found were the gargoyle leader and Blaise. Kerrigan was an unconvincing dark lord, and for a villainess Morgen is about as effective as Hilary Duff in goth-wear. And don't get me started on Seren. I liked her a lot better after her apparent personality transplant halfway through, but I never felt any affection for her. I found myself more intrigued by the minor characters.

There were spots of humor, spots of genuinely good writing, but they were painfully few and far between. It just read like a rough draft of a much better novel.

I won't bore the readers with another summary of the this book - other reviewers have covered it quite nicely. This will be the last book I purchase with MacGregor as author. There were so many plot holes in this book, it started to resemble a piece of Swiss cheese. In one scene, MacGregor writes that the mandrake, Blaise, looks up to see Kerrigan being beaten to a bloody pulp, and loses all color in his (Blaise's) face. I'd like to see how that happens, as he is supposedly an albino. The end of the story culminates into a rescue of Kerrigan, headed up by Seren, of course. Mind you, they have to extract him from Morgen's evil clutches, on Morgen's turf, where she is most powerful, and she has all her minions around her. No brilliant plan of rescue, no prior planning at all, just a, "I'm going in to get him". Amazingly, they land in the castle, push their way through the crowd, Seren gets p*ssed off, and knocks down everybody with her anger (though it might have been her breath, I don't know, this reader lost interest after page 50). Another plot hole - Garafyn complains that he is "tired" of getting Morgen Starbuck's coffee, and is ready to rebel. If Morgen is that powerful to transport gargoyles into the 21st century, you would think she could whip up a Starbucks coffee, or a coffee machine at the very least. I mean, apparently, she already has a CD player and several cds, why not a Starbucks cafe?

Another irritant of MacGregor's, she has the characters use a mixture of 21st century slang, intermixed with period Old English. I don't mind that as much as I mind Seren, about the ONLY character who has never been into the future, start using slang, too. At one point, she asks Kerrigan why he doesn't "pop" into another area. I don't think the word "pop" was around waayyyy back then. This is a huge problem of all of MacGregor's works, she gets confused between her role as MacGregor the historical romance author, and Kenyon the contemporary romance author. Some people may not have a problem with the character's dialogue, but it was extremely distracting to me. So many other authors seem to be able to match the dialogue with the period.

As far as the chemistry between Seren and Kerrigan, all I can say is "ugh, whatever". Just can't see why Seren could fall for Kerrigan, who is supposed to be a bad guy, but comes across as a powder puff (all bark, no bite...er rather, he does bite....oh well). He's supposedly so evil he carries no heat (I can't see how it can turn Seren on to make love to a cold fish - I said eww for their first love making session), and his eyes glow red when he's angry, in addition to him yelling at her all the time - nowadays, we call that an abusive relationship. Oh, yes, did I mention that he stabs her, too? But, unintentionally of course. She ends up looking like a huge Welcome mat.

Overall, this story is a disjointed combination of vampires, knights, sorcery, dragons, gargoyles, RVs, "troubled" heros, etc. I enjoyed my niece's book "Eragon", written by Paolini, better. At the time Paolini wrote Eragon, he was only 17 - and at 17, he wrote a better medieval/fantasy/sorcery book than MacGregor has ever written. MacGregor needs to seriously, do more research on medieval times. I don't recommend this book at all.

I have always found Kinley MacGregor/Sherilyn Kenyon books nearly perfect escapist reading and this one is a keeper. Ms. MacGregor takes the myth of Camelot and shakes it up, turns it around and teaches it how to dance!! After the fall of Arthur, Morgen le Fey takes over Camelot, and establishes a new King with the opposite sword to Excalibur, The Sword of Darkness. The new king, black-hearted and evil Kerrigan is of course devastatingly handsome.

After a few centuries, Kerrigan is pretty much bored with being King, even with his time traveling abilities but kidnaps Seren, the peasant girl who is destined to be the mother of the next Merlin. Morgen thinks she can take over the world with the power of the child under her sway.

The plot of the rest of the book is pretty much to formula-the power of a good woman's love to reform the worst of rogues, etc. However it is written with such humor and charm, and with a wealth of entertaining characters. I got a lot of good chuckles, especially from Garofyn, the gargoyle.

Great escapist fun!

Kerrigan is the king of Camelot and Darkness. He is ruthless and cares for nothing until he captures a spirited peasant who is unlike anything he's ever known. Despite the fact that her sassy attitude speaks to a part of him he didn't know existed, he will do what he set out to do. He will either kill Seren or barter her away in order to claim King Arthur's Round Table. What he's not counting on is Seren waking his long dead heart or makes him think his life could be better.

Seren has no idea what her future holds. She dreams of one day being a freewoman and weaving her wonderful fabric for sale to the nobles. Imagine her surprise when she is taken by a handsome knight and then forced to face the fact that Merlin and Arthur aren't a made up characters and that her life is directly tied to Camelot. Will she be able to accept her destiny and Kerrigan as he is or will she turn her back on her chance at happiness?

Ms. MacGregor's latest series is off to a grand start with "Sword of Darkness." Ms. MacGregor has taken the Arthurian legend and given it a twist making this a unique series that I eagerly look forward to continuing. Kerrigan is an anti-hero and she has done a wonderful job of turning this character into a hero the reader will care about. This demonstrates the talent of this writer.

I'm a fan of Kinley MacGregor's work. Love the "Master" series and the Brotherhood of the Sword books are great. The author stated that she interrupted her Brotherhood of Sword series because she was "inspired" to write this instead. Unfortunately inspirational isn't a word i could use to describe this. The descriptive words that DO come to mind include: trite, insipid, maladroit, and rudimentary. Considering the effort the author obviously put into coming up with the world in which this novel takes place, one would think she'd have put SOME effort into the plot This book was a real let down. Or rather a real put down, as i put it down half way through and couldn't bring myself to pick it back up. Do yourself a favor and skip it.

Two-thirds of the book takes place in a bedroom with angst from both parties. The book needs action from somewhere. This retelling of the Arturian legend could have been skipped. I was not impressed with the flow of language, the characters, or the plot. This author needs a rewrite.

I have love Kinley Mac Gregor's books. Have even enjoyed the Dark Hunter series although I do agree they have become a regurgitation of one another. This book started out strong but then became bizarre. I had a hard time finishing it and that has never happened to me before with any of her books.

It felt like a cinderella-type fairy tale. Downtrodden peasant girl is taken by a prince of darkness, but he turns into a prince of goodness due to her influence. In the beginning, she stood up to him, did not fear him, this intriqued him, and he then fell for her. Their falling for each other seemed a little too quick and unexplained for me. I also did not like the many references to 20th century living. This story takes place in the middle ages, yet some of the characters would use words from the 20th century as if they lived in the 20th century. For example, she loves her Starbucks coffee, this is not a suicide hotline, I saw that happen on an episode of X-Files. Since some of the characters had the ability to time travel, I don't understand why they would choose to stay in the middle ages. Time-travel was not necessary to the plot. The only time it was connected to the plot was when they were running away from the evil queen for a short while before they returned to the safe place of Avalon (in the middle ages). The time-travel comments were a disconnect. They interrupted the flow of the story. I felt that the author was trying to be "cute," but I found it annoying rather than funny. The only redeeming quality in this story was that there were a few interesting plot developments.

Sexual language: mild. Number of sex scenes: four. Setting: middle ages, London, Camelot and Avalon. Genre: historical, paranormal romance.

For a list of my reviews of other books by this author, see my 3 star review of "Night Pleasures" by Sherrilyn Kenyon (aka Kinley MacGregor) posted 6/19/08.