Eden Forest by Aoife Marie Sheridan, A Book Review

A fantasy that keeps you reading, wondering and entertained.  So much can be developed with fiction, but without characters you enjoy, the story never blossoms.  Aoife keeps you entertained, and involved.  It's a good read and you'll want to read the sequels to find out what else happens.

Writing a fantasy fiction can be so much fun, but still making it believable is a little bit harder than many think.  You have to work hard on development of the characters to be sure that the reader understands, believes and can emotionally attach to what is happening to them.  Aoife does work on that, but should have gone a little further to make the reader cheer for their success and cry for their loss with more definitive reactions to certain things.
Keeping the reader involved in the story is all about the characters and the movement of their lives.  The theme of this book is not only interesting, it's entertaining, and believable, at least as much as fantasy can be.  The story keeps moving, and it definitely creates pictures in your mind.  I really do want to read the next book and see what happens.  For her first book, I think it was done quite well, and subsequent ones should be even better.
What the main character learns would be shocking to most people, but she doesn't seem to react too much to it, which dampens your reaction.  This leaves you wondering if you missed something that explained her calm reaction. 

The book moves from one world to another, and one character's story to another, so sometimes you really start to feel like you are in the story understanding each person.  But yet still trying to figure out the why of what happens keeps you reading.

Aoife did a good job of tying everything together though, allowing you to see the whole picture and yet from different views of the characters.  Each character definitely had their personalities and you certainly knew what you liked and didn't like.  So when some reactions missed the mark, you create your own idea of why and what happened to make them so.  That's okay unless later in the story or sequel what happens changes everything you created.  Then your whole ideas may leave you less than happy with the character and the story, hence the quest of defining the character and all their reactions in a full spectrum of disposition.

A huge plus is Aoife creates likable, even lovable characters that still have some flaws like a normal person.  On the opposite side she creates some that you dislike, but still have something about them that makes you want them to see them come around to the good side.

All in all this was a great story, good characters, and a writing well done.  I think everyone would enjoy this book and be anxious to read the sequels.