Cirsova – The Bookhunter’s Apprentice

Posted On July 5, 2019

Sometimes you come across a story that’s perfectly fine, but just not to your tastes.  The Bookhunter’s Apprentice is one such tale.  It’s a bit of a heist tale set up when twin sorcerers do an intelligent and evil tome of lost knowledge dirty and pay the price.  The titular bookhunter shows up to rescue the grimoire and adopts a young slave-girl to aid in the endeavor.  The mystery, the characters, and the action scenes are great, and Barbara Doran manages to squeeze in a nice 80s-style training montage.

And yet it gets a big, fat “meh” from me.

Perhaps it’s the western chauvinist in me.  Maybe I’m feeling my Independence Day oats.  Whatever it is, nothing about the eastern style of fantasy, sci-fi, computer RPGs, or animation ever grabbed me by the ears and made me look.  Hopping zombies, confusing character names, cultural and historical assumptions?  All of that just sucks me out of the story.  If you’re into that foreign stuff, or eager to earn some modren cachet, you’d probably love this story.

It’s just not for me.