Description: ”The first novel to be released in The Foreworld Saga, The Mongoliad: Book One, is an epic-within-an-epic, taking place in 13th century. In it, a small band of warriors and mystics raise their swords to save Europe from a bloodthirsty Mongol invasion. Inspired by their leader (an elder of an order of warrior monks), they embark on a perilous journey and uncover the history of hidden knowledge and conflict among powerful secret societies that had been shaping world events for millennia.

The Mongoliad began as a social media experiment, combining serial story-telling with a unique level of interaction between authors and audience during the creative process. Since its original iteration, The Mongoliad has been restructured, edited, and rewritten under the supervision of its authors to create a more cohesive reading experience and will be published as a trilogy of novels. This edition is the definitive edition and is the authors’ preferred text.”

Taken from Amazon

Rating: **

Review: I know, I know. I’m a hideously vile reviewer for giving something by Neal Stephenson (and other fabulous authors) a 2 star rating. I’m sorry, but I have to. Between the slow plot and the long-winded descriptions, I couldn’t keep my eyes open. This took me forever to finish.

Trust me, my own rating breaks my heart, because I really wanted to love this book. I thought the origin of this book was badass and I dug the social media element of it. (I even created a username on the official website in order to access all of the additional materials.) I’m also a history buff and an action fan, so this *should* have been up my alley. It was just meh. It was just there.

The Mongoliad boasts 7 contributors in all, and I can’t help but think that that’s where the problem lies. At times, it did feel disjointed and the story was told from the perspectives of far too many characters. I do have to give The Mongoliad some credit though – the writing itself is above average. Any word nerd will relish the $5 words that are used throughout the epic. I kept my phone close by, so that I could look them up in my Dictionary.com app.

Final word: The lackluster plot won’t keep you reading past your bedtime.

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