The Sorcery Code

The Sorcery Code

by Dima Zales & Anna Zaires

2 out of 5

Synopsis
From the internationally bestselling authors who brought you the Krinar Chronicles comes a captivating tale of intrigue, love, and danger in a world where sorcery is entwined with science . . . 

Once a respected member of the Sorcerer Council and now an outcast, Blaise has spent the last year of his life working on a special magical object. The goal is to allow anyone to do magic, not just the sorcerer elite. The outcome of his quest is unlike anything he could’ve ever imagined – because, instead of an object, he creates Her.

She is Gala, and she is anything but inanimate. Born in the Spell Realm, she is beautiful and highly intelligent – and nobody knows what she’s capable of. She will do anything to experience the world . . . even leave the man she is beginning to fall for.

Augusta, a powerful sorceress and Blaise’s former fiancée, sees Blaise’s deed as the ultimate hubris and Gala as an abomination that must be destroyed. In her quest to save the human race, Augusta will forge new alliances, becoming tangled in a web of intrigue that stretches further than any of them suspect. She may even have to turn to her new lover Barson, a ruthless warrior who might have an agenda of his own . . .



Review
In his bid to make magic accessible to the common people, the sorcerer Blaise tries to create a sentient magical object.  He is shocked when instead, he is faced with a beautiful young woman.

Treating magic like science; political court drama; and a war against the rebels - this sounds like my perfect book!

I couldn't even get half-way before I gave up.
I'll admit, I've persevered with much worse books, but I was just so plain bored, and there are so many other books demanding my attention right now.

So what went wrong?
The first thing I noticed about the narration and the characters is that it was all very smug.  Oh look how amazingly awesome we are.  We are so much cleverer than everyone else!  I'm just going to wallow in my own supreme beauty!
I couldn't stand it.  The book is shared between four narrators - Blaise, his ex-fiance Augusta, her new lover and army legend Barson, and the mysterious Gala.  But there is no variation in tone, speech, thought, or level-of-smugness to distinguish between them.  There wasn't a single character that I liked - well, ok, I sort of liked the two surrogate mother figures that live in the village, they were the only ones that stood out as real for me.  But blink and you miss it.

The awesome magic:
A scientific breakdown of magic, with rules of logic etc, I am a big fan of - what can I say, I'm a geek.  But The Sorcery Code just took all the fun out of magic.  It was honestly so laboured, and the steps in creating a spell so slow, it's a wonder the rebels haven't run in, cut the sorcerer's head off, gone home for tea, and put their feet up.
Honestly, if there's got to be placement chanting, and word arrangement, forethought and ages of planning; I cannot see how magic is an advantage.  Just take the first battle for example - Augusta plans to help her side win with magic.  Even using a cheating short-cut she designed, she nearly screws it up.

The political drama:
There's some guy you don't trust *shiftyshifty*
Ok, this part was a little more promising, but couldn't pick me up out of the slump of pretty dresses and droning magic.  There was nothing that particularly stood out.

The war:
Yeah... that was just a chance for Barson to play with his manly sword and show off how awesome he was.  Ten commoners to one of him?  Pfft, easy.
And a chance for Augusta to fly above the melee on her enchanted chaise longue (which if you're not sure, is one of these - in my opinion, it's the perfect representation of the book, being a bit pretentious and lacking any oomph.  If you're wondering why I'm wasting my time discussing a piece of furniture for so long, I would say it is only fair - Augusta's chaise is mentioned as much as any plot or character).
... where was I?  Oh yes, so Augusta is flying on her chaise, thinking how amazing her magic skills are that she could destroy the rebel army if she so desired.  I didn't feel there was any danger, or threat against the awesomeness of their skills.

Anyways, I won't be continuing with the series, but the book is free, so you can check it out and decide for yourself.

Goodreads link
Amazon.co.uk