David EstesCritiques

Books that are different are good, but this book, was just odd. Not necessarily in a bad way, but odd nevertheless. Reading was slightly uncomfortable as the style just didn't sit right for me.

This book is a somewhat generic YA fiction about a girl struggling with the role given to her by her society. Easy enough to read, with nothing mind bending or heartbreaking. I would warn potential readers that the writing style, due to the narrating character's voice, won't appeal to everyone.

In opposition to most other readers here, this would not be a book that I would recommend. If you are already familiar with work by this author, however, it seems from other reviews that you would probably enjoy it.

First, thanks to David Estes for giving me a free copy of his book to read and review.

I really liked the idea of this different version of Angels and Demons. David created a new mythology on how they were created, and toyed with the reader’s minds on which one is helping, or out to hurt humans, very clever.

Now on to the spoilers and some thoughts about how the book was written.


Taylor is the main character in this book. She’s a college student, which I liked, instead of the typical high school student in most young adult books. Gabriel is the Angel who she falls in love with. Where I had trouble with Taylor, is that she often reminds herself in the book that her mother didn’t raise a dummy, to trust her gut instincts and that Taylor didn’t need a guy to complete her as a person. Taylor repeats this over and over to herself like a mantra, yet never listens. Her gut tells her not to trust Gabriel over and over, but she does. She doesn’t need a man to complete her, but falls in love with Gabriel after only four days. Gabriel lies to her over and over and even after he promised not to lie to her again, he does, and she believes him. I understand that love can make a person ‘blind,’ but Taylor verges on being stupid. It was very frustrating reading about her choices, I wanted to smack her and shout, “Wake up!” Taylor starts out as a clear-thinking, independent female, but once she falls for Gabriel, she turns into a mound of goo that bases her decisions on what her boyfriend tells her to believe. Not my image of a strong female character or role model for a young girl reading this book.

I found the secondary characters, Samantha, Taylor’s best friend, and Christopher, Sam’s boyfriend who’s a Demon, much more interesting and entertaining. Samantha remained spunky and independent throughout the book even though she fell in love with Christopher.

“The Plan,” was genius and horrifying at the same time. What was amusing was that everyone seemed to have a “plan’ of some kind in the book. Dionysus, the leader of the Angel Council, had the ultimate ‘PLAN’ of enslaving humans. Gabriel had a plan for Taylor to fall in love with him, then later a plan to ‘protect her and escape from the demons at the college,’ and still another plan to rescue her from the battlefield. The demon Jonas, had a plan to scare Taylor and Gabriel into not to try anything funny and escape. The Angel army had a plan to destroy the Demons, and the Demons had a plan to save Taylor. Finally at the end, there’s a plan to save Gabriel from prison. There are so many plans flying around in this book it reminds me of the show ‘Black Adder’ where Baldric is fond of saying, ‘I have a cunning plan.’ And we all know how his cunning plans turned out. I think it would be a good idea to cut down on the number of ‘plans’ because the idea of a plan, lost its ability to create tension since there were so many of them scattered throughout the book.

I noticed that my mind seemed to wander while reading the story and I asked myself why. I realized that there was a lot of ‘telling’ going on instead of ‘showing.’ There was too much internal dialogue and talk about what was happening on campus, where they were walking to and other insignificant things, etc. It was unnecessary padding to the story that didn’t move it along. The extra information only slowed the story down. I think that much of the description could have been cut out and not have been missed. In fact it would have sped up the tempo of the story, and if the rest of the story was tightened up, the book would have been much more exciting. The chapters where we first met Gabriel were very short and precise. I felt the tension in those chapters, wondering, is Gabriel lying, or is he telling the truth to Taylor? Those short chapters were much more intense for me and drew me into the book, more than the other chapters with all the extra description.

Oh, and I can't forget the ending, that was a terrific cliff-hanger!

In the end, even though I found quite a few things wanting in this book, I really like the way the author created the war between Angels and Demons, the legend of how Angels and Demons were created, and also created the villain in Dionysus, who reminds me of Voldemort, in his desire to achieve immortality at any cost.

I enjoyed this story and am very curious on where the author will take this in his next books. I’d recommend this book to anyone who is interested in a different take on Angels and Demons.

I was given this book to read through Basically Books ARR group for an honest review, thank you.



I first read David Estes’ book Angel Evolution and had liked it so I wanted to give The Moon Dwellers a try to see if I’d also enjoy it; and also to see how much, if any, David’s writing had improved. I can say without a doubt that David’s writing has definitely improved. The Moon Dwellers is nice and orderly. What I mean by this is that David arranged each chapter pertaining to Adele and Tristan and had a similar event happen to them. It was a sort of synchronicity that would bring the two MCs together and David made sure the chapters showed the readers how the similarities worked into Adele and Tristan’s lives even when they weren’t together. I’m not quite sure where David is going with the topic of “Fate” versus “Making Your Own Destiny” in this book, but it’s brought up quite a few times. Also another theme in this book is about family. How family can be by birth or blood and a person may not have anything in common with them. But a person can create a family where people have more similarities with you and you love them even more than blood relatives.

The story is told in first person through the alternating viewpoints of Adele and Tristan. David did a great job of making it clear whose eyes we were seeing the story through. However, I’m not sure that first person was the way to go in this book. The MCs voices came out flat and monotone throughout the book. I felt like I was reading a diary of the MCs thoughts. I didn’t get a good feeling of the kind of personalities they had unless one MC was talking about the personality of the other MC, but that was only telling me, I never felt it. The only image I got was that Adele seemed controlled and Tristan was naïve. I got very good impressions of the personalities of the secondary characters through the eyes of the MCs. Tawni, Cole, Roc, and even Rivet were vibrant and alive. But Adele and Tristan felt flat. That’s why I think the MCs would have been much better in third person. The only time I wasn’t bothered by the flatness of the MCs was when the action started to pick up with Adele escaping the Pen and Tristan arriving at the Pen.

What I liked about each chapter, was that David would end it on a slight cliffhanger. Just enough of a cliffhanger to make me want to know immediately what was going to happen with the MC we were reading, but not so much that we didn't want to read the other MC's POV that was coming up. It was very clever.

Before I go into the characters I have to say I am so happy that David didn't make this story into 'love at first sight.' I can completely see having 'attraction at first sight,' and that made a great reason for Tristan to hunt for Adele.

I liked Adele in that she was able to stand up for herself, but she still was afraid and she wasn’t always successful in what she set out to do. She was still fallible but was not a whiny teenager about it. Tristan seems like he was a lost soul looking for purpose in a meaningless life and he found it in Adele. I can easily see a teenage boy doing something very impulsive like running away to chase after a girl. Teenagers are known to take ridiculous risks because they don’t really have that fear yet of death or of consequences. So Tristan running away makes sense. I love Roc, he is adorable. Loyal to a fault, tries to do his best, and is funny. I think he’s probably my favorite character in the book. My one question is, David, why oh why, did you have to kill offCole? I am so sad.

The pace of the story was slow until Adele, Tawni and Cole make their escape from the Pen. After that the story was more exciting and I didn’t want to put the book down. The book is also an easy fast read, I think in part due to the way David set up the chapters and viewpoints, it made it easier to keep the MCs separate and what was happening to them.

I read this story on my NOOK and there were some odd formatting issues. Words would get cut off at the end of a sentence mid-word. I’m not talking about a word like “talking,” with the “talk” at the end of the line and “ing” at the beginning of the next line. I mean words like “are” where the “ar” is at the end of a line and the “e” starts the next sentence. This happened quite frequently with many different words and it made reading difficult trying to decipher what word I was looking at. I’d have to go back and piece the letters together and it would take me out of the story.

There were a couple of things in the book that I wondered about and don’t remember it being covered or discussed. I believe the issue of where the water came from was lightly gone over, but I would like to know about where they got the air? I wouldn’t think it was from the surface if the Earth’s surface was destroyed and lots of particulate matter was still floating around or noxious fumes. The other thought I had was how hot was it below ground? I know that limestone caverns can be cool, but what about in mines where it can get pretty hot? How do the Dwellers deal with either the cold or the heat? And does it get colder or hotter as they go to a lower level? I would love to have answers on this since it’s something pretty important that the Dwellers have to deal with and something that could make their lives more or less pleasant and also factor into the uprising.

Last but not least, I want to say that I really like the cover. Very nice with the colors, the art and the fonts chosen.

In the end, I enjoyed this book. Because of the flatness of the MCs personalities, I was going to give the book only three stars, that’s how much the bland voices bothered me. But because the action picked up enough to draw my attention away from the monotone POVs, I give The Moon Dwellers 4 stars

I am really intrigued by David Estes and his premise for this first novel in a dystopian sci-fi series, “Slip.” The main character, Benson, who we know only as “son” for much of the opening section of the book, is forced to live in hiding after his parents illegally allow him to be born despite strict population control measures. But the characters that are drawn the most poignantly aren’t the main ones, but the side players like Janice, the mother who can’t be there for one child her husband has to tell to run away, or her other child, Harrison, whose plight we feel perhaps most of all as the sibling who was neglected from the start because of the secret brother he has no idea about. It’s an interesting and complicated world where there are no winners.

I overall loved the author’s writing style and storytelling and especially enjoyed the great twists at the end. Highly recommended.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the author.

A fun read! Can't wait for the next books in the series!

A good read

I did enjoy this book. The post apocalyptic story line along with living underground was what drew me to the book. There are a few parts that you want to question since they are underground and you wonder "how?" I have a feeling those parts of the book I questioned just might come to light in future books.....I will be reading to find out.

Great follow up

If you read my review for the first book I had some questions. Well lets just say those questions have been answered and now my questions are filled with excitement wondering what is going to happen in the third book!!!

A dweller fan must read.

Very good book. I really enjoyed how it showed to us we all wondered whole reading the Dweller series. I took Mr. estes' advise and I am going to finish the Country Saga before returning to finish the Dweller series. These books are so reasonably priced and so well written, what a treat!!

A Great great book

What an awesome couple of series! Segwaying from the Dweller to Country series and back to the Dweller....BRILLIANT!!!!!! I wish there were more than just one book left and would absolutely love to see both series made into an HBO series or movie.

Bullman

A truly must read!!!!!

For those out there who like fantasy and sci-fi and wonder about time on earth as a different place then you have to read both series by David Estes!!!!! I am a disabled fire fighter who reads 3-4 books a week and these 2 series are absolutely great reads. I did not want them to end and dropped my Kindle on my face several times trying to stay awake to read....... Thank you Mr. Estes for a great new read that was not transparent.

S. Bull

A very good book and great series

A great imagination

Wow, David Estes sure knows how to deprive people of sleep. Once I started reading this series I can not stop! A genuine story packed with action and story twists. The writing is superb as always and the editing is spot on. David Estes ranks right up there with George R.R. Martin in my book. A A A

One of the best trilogies I have ever read

David Estes has done it once again. A superb storyline that captures you and takes you on the ride of your life. Suspenseful, heart warming, action packed and one of the best stories I have ever read. I like to point out discrepancies and errors for the author but there is absolutely nothing to change! I am so thankful you decided to leave account ting behind!

Absolutely fabulous

One of the best series starting books I've ever read. You can not put this book down, at least I didn't !

2nd time reading

I read this series when it first came out. I thoroughly enjoyed it then and now. I love David's books!

Good book. Solid story! I'm not sure if I will pick up the other 2 in the series quite yet but David Estes is a mighty fine storyteller.

definitely not as amazingly awesome as the Dwellers Series, or as nicely written, but it was still a good read.
although I will not be reading the rest of the series.

Okay, so I've just finished this book and I'm sorry the review is a bit late but that's because school decided to make us start next year's work early so they were working us really hard right up till the last day and I had no time to read :( Anyway, I've rated this book 3 stars because I quite liked it but it was nothing special.

I'm going to start with the thing that has been bugging me most throughout the book: all the explanations. It seemed like the author thought he was writing this book for 7 year old incompetent readers who need every little detail explaining. Almost every sarcastic phrase in the book has been explained as if we readers are stupid and it really got on my nerves. David Estes – This book is aimed at young adults, it it not? It is not aimed at children but at teens who can understand more or less everything an adult can. I've only got one quote to show what I mean but if I had time I'm sure I could find countless more, many of which are probably worse than this but it'll have to do for now:
“Gabriel pretended like his heart was broken by clutching both hands to the left side of his chest.“That hurts, Tay, it really hurts.” ”
See? Most readers over the age of ten would not need to have it explained that Gabriel was only pretending to be upset. It is obvious without the explanation and honestly, I think that sort of ruined the whole mood of the scene. It made me feel as if I was just reading a book instead of being there with the characters in the book. I'm a huge fan of sarcasm in books but only if we have to figure it out for ourselves, like in the real world.

Anyway, let's go on to happier matters. I loved the idea for the story. I loved how the author took something classic and completely changed it into something modern and interesting. It shows real creativity to do that and a bit of bravery to risk doing something that might be ridiculed by countless readers who believe that all the rules set be legends should be stuck to and only altered in the smallest of ways. So yeah, high five on that. It made the story worth reading and very unique without being too weird.

Okay so that's all for now but I might edit it it later when I'm not busy :)

Holiday read. It was fun but I don't really know how to rate it in stars.

4.5 stars

4.5 stars

This was a great read with a wonderful cast of characters, a compelling plot, and I read it in 24 hours. Although there are a lot of parallels to the Pinocchio story, it was still a very unique tale with its own deeper message. I have to say that my favorite part about this story is the author's descriptions. There were moments where I got so lost in the description that I had to stop and go back and re-read the description again. It was so rich, vivid and absolutely inspiring. Just thinking of some of the descriptions gives me chills now. I loved this book, and plan on checking out more of Mr. Estes' work because if they are anything like the beauty of Strings, then it will be time and money well spent!

♪♫My Pick For Book Theme Song♫♪
♫Another One Bites The Dust by Queen --Another series finished, I'm seriously on a roll with finishing series lately…so this song is for all of the series that I've conquered lately…also…because David Estes is not afraid to kill off key people and he literally slayed me with some throughout the series, especially one in particular from this very book…♫

Overall Rating: 4.8/5 Stars (Grade=A)

Book Title: Earth Dwellers
Author: David Estes
Series: Book #7 of the combined Dwellers and Country Sagas
Genre: YA, Dystopian
Source: Own Kindle eBook


⇝My Thoughts⇜

Can you imagine people living underground? Like way underground…so far down, it takes a half hour to get to the surface.

Imagine a fake sun, a fake horizon, a fake moon, even fake stars…and then imagine never knowing anything different.

It's crazy to think about…the premise of this series is an intricately woven one. 7 books in total 3 from Dwellers saga, and 3 from the Country saga, all culminating in one final book…Earth Dwellers. All the players (at least the ones he hasn't killed off) are here, but the book pov switches between only 4 of the main characters from other books: Sienna, Dazz, Adele and Tristan…even Perry makes an appearance. Overall, a gripping, yet sweetly pleasing end to this total series. There's so much more he (David Estes) could do with this world, though. Oh…the possibilities…

⇝Ratings Breakdown⇜

Plot: 4.5/5
Characters: 5/5
The Feels: 4.5/5
Addictiveness: 4/5
Theme: 5/5
Flow: 5/5
Backdrop (World Building): 5/5
Originality: 5/5
Book Cover: 4/5
Ending: 4.8/5 Cliffhanger: Nope

Will I read more from David Estes? Why yes, I would…

This book reminded me a lot of Blood Red Road by Moira Young. I liked the use of language to help draw you into the world. I like how the language is different and used throughout the book. It feels realistic to me. If I were to overhear a conversation in the future after civilization breaks down, what would it sound like?

I liked the grit and reality of the story. The world Siena lives in is extremely sexist and patriarchal in nature. The women seem pliable and submissive in the beginning, but I like how they are more in depth and stronger than originally depicted. Siena is frustrating, makes bad decisions and sometimes acts or talks before she thinks. Having once been a fifteen/sixteen year old girl, I actually think she was fairly realistic. I think sometimes, especially in young adult, the characters are teenagers, but act more like twenty or thirty year olds. Even in the end of times, I think teenagers will always be teenagers.

The world we are shown is limited, and so is the information we are given. However, since the book is from Siena's perspective we can't know more than she does, so I don't mind the mystery. I hope that the author continues to develop the worlds as the series develops and progresses.

I only gave it four stars as the story line does jump at times. There were a few times I had to go back and re-read sections as I thought I missed something. But it was just the way the book was written.

Overall I liked the story. There are some interesting themes on the roles of men and women and power. I liked how both topics were woven between society and family. I cared what happened to the characters and had several moments of tense reading. It has some mature subjects, but isn't too over the top or inappropriate. I look forward to reading the second book!

The more I read David Estes the more I love his writing! I don't think I've read a series that builds on each book in such a unique way. The first book introduced me to Fire Country and at first when I started Ice Country I was disappointed that the story line seemed to be comprised of an entirely new set of characters. Not that they were bad, or that the story wasn't good; I just wanted more of Siena and Skye and the mysteries that were left unanswered. But on I read, and I am so glad I did. I love, love, love how everything was brought together in this book!

Dazz and Buff are great characters. Strong headed and again, as most teenagers, making stupid decisions with the best of intentions. Again, we don't know about a lot going on around since this is from Dazz's perspective, but again, somehow it works and I am just left wanting more of this world!

Estes has a way of pulling you into the world in it's entirety. You may not know everything about the bigger picture, but he is a master at not just building the suspense of the story but also of submersing you in the world as the characters see it. You want to know more, feel their emotions and frustration. I think he also does a wonderful job of building the nuances of the different cultures created in these isolated communities.

As with Fire Country, I was left with the immediate need to read the next book in the series. I want to know what characters I will be introduced to and how the journey of Skye, Siena, Circ, Feve, Dazz and Buff will continue! I highly recommend this series!