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The Gauntlet of Pong Wu
Nicholas Powter’s The Gauntlet of Pong Wu is a tragic story of love, family, and treachery. Set in the mystical land of Pong Wu, this story follows the life of Antatirgo, a local chief’s daughter. While the story begins with two warriors dueling for her hand in marriage, things soon take an apocalyptic turn.
Demons invade her village and she is tragically separated from her sister Wytgo. In a last-ditch attempt to save herself and find her sister, she lets a demon possess her after he promises to help her. Ultimately, this decision takes her down a dangerous path, one of pain and unexpected challenges.
As expected from a story with gods, angels, and demons, a lot of the language used in this book is quite unique – this particular story posses a flair for horrid descriptions and uses a lot of old English terms. While this adds authenticity to the spellbinding narrative that immerses you in the well-crafted world, I think it can be overwhelming at times. While the dialogue is substantive and sincere, delivering much of the emotional impact of the novel, I felt it was ponderous at times and ti was hard to nail down who was talking.
These minor quibbles aside, the plot of The Gauntlet of Pong Wu driving this riveting story forward is absolutely enthralling and sets up some very impactful scenes that will stay with you long after you’ve put the book down. The author has a way of always keeping you on your toes. This epic paranormal fantasy novel expertly depicts how much one is willing to endure for the love of family. I really enjoyed the ending to this dark fantasy novel as well, it is quite tragic and unpredictable, and left me with a lot of mixed feelings, which I think is what a good novel is supposed to do.
The Gauntlet of Pong Wu is an emotionally charged adventure novel with a rich backstory and fascinating characters that make it hard to put this book down.
Pages: 97 | ISBN: 198229065X
Passing on a Legacy
Nicholas John Powter Author Interview
The Young follows a war veteran who must take up arms to protect his family and friends from the evil forces in the Deluge lands. What was the inspiration for the setup to this thrilling story?
Well i was watching the fellowship of the ring one night and i thought wouldn’t it be cool to make my own universe with its own lore, characters, environment, creatures, supernatural entities etc. and i was really inspired by that Tolkien fella and so i decided i would try my hand at making a story about the battle between good and evil on an epic scale.
Sven is an intriguing and well developed character. What were some ideas that guided his character development?
Well i made him across between Aragorn (LOTR) and piccolo (DBZ) and i wanted to make him an over the hill warrior who struggles with his own wrongdoings, sins so to speak and have him to be tested with his loyalty and devotion to his family and his faith.
I thought that this story was about good ultimately triumphing as long as there are people who believe. What were some themes you felt were important to the story?
Well i felt that good always wins and triumphs in the end particularly when their likewise minded people behind it and that its essential for mankind to have the three major components in life: family, country, god i think those fundamentally extremely important to humanity particularly in this mythology. But the ultimate theme of the book is passing on a legacy onto your offspring, your young and making sure you raise the next of kin properly with those three major components taught to them.
When and where will this book be available?
I think it should be available within in this year if things goes according to plan with production and should be available on GoodReads and Barnes and Noble.
The Young – Book Review
The Young
The Young by Nicholas John Powter
Sven is a war veteran who cannot yet lay down his arms because he still has to protect his family and friends from the evil forces in the Deluge lands. For a while, he has little to do and lives quietly with his youngest son, Fren but soon, chaos erupts and our war hero and his loved ones become the target of an evil tyrant Roland who wishes to absorb the essence of the evil night gods and take over the world for them. Now Sven and Fren must rise to protect their friends, battle mind-numbing sorcery, find Dason, Sven’s eldest son and leave the unsafe lands to a new location. But will all this prove to be too daunting? Will the forces of darkness prevail over the forces of light? Will our hero finally lay down his arms and find rest?
The Young by Nicholas Powter is an epic fantasy novel detailing the adventures of a brave war hero and his equally courageous son. The events in the book are set in medieval times in an imaginary land called The Deluge where fantastic beasts reign and cities within mountains prevail. And while Powter doesn’t spend much time giving intricate details of the surroundings, he makes sure to provide vital vivid images that still help us perceive man’s crude habits in those times. These images help set a perfect stage for the characters’ thrilling adventures.
Powter’s proficiency doesn’t end at setting a solid stage for his story, it also extends to his description of the characters in his book. He strikes a balance between showing us who the characters are through their actions and also having them tell us themselves and this helps to move the story along at a decent pace.
As the story moves along, Powter strings together events that pass few but very clear messages – you can’t miss them. We see ideas like the strength of the bonds of family and friendship and the power of courage as shown in Sven’s resolve to save his son and his friend’s wife. We also glean the themes of the continuous war between good and evil and man’s role in choosing which of these sides to submit to. Apart from these themes, two others also stand out. One relates to the categories of people most susceptible to deceit – the young or naïve, the overly curious, and the covetous – and the other is a soothing message that good will ultimately prevail if there are still people who believe in it and are ready to fight for it.
Powter might not be Tolkien or C.S Lewis but he surely did some things that caught my fancy. The story is kept simple and has no pointless detours. On top of this I found the story to be fairly imaginative. These two factors made the book a decent read on the whole even though I felt the narration could have been more engaging.
LITERARY TITAN 