They Mostly Come Out at Night

I'm going to be really nice with my rating. This is an indie book and a pretty sweet one at that, so even though I will list some issues with it, I think it has value and Mr. Patrick deserves to be encouraged.

Monsters come at night to small villages in the forest, when people hide in the cellars. Because of a misunderstood incident, Lonan is treated like a horrible person, making everyone hate him, up until he starts having dreams about the mysterious Magpie King, who is the person supposedly defending the people from even more harm being done by the monsters. In the end Lonan needs to work with what he got to know through his dreams to save everyone, from the people of the Magpie King and his own loved ones, including the girl who refused even to be decent towards him until now because of that old incident in their childhood.

The thing I liked about this the most was the atmosphere. It actually felt like something you could see in a twisted fairy tale cartoon, with some interesting visuals. Maybe puppets or some sort, with dark colours. It just had that weird style, like some story that could be the written version of creepy stories told to scare kids. I don't know, it just really worked well. Sometimes it had odd choices of words (don't mention adrenaline in creepy fairy tales, it sticks out in an awkward way). All in all, this part of the story worked well.
I especially liked the little chapters of in-universe folk stories sprinkled in. I generally like it when the novels are broken up with things like that, so I guess not everyone will care so much, but I did. They felt like authentic stuff that could potentially exist.

The story itself had enough twists and turns to keep it interesting. Sure, it is a short one, but I felt like it had enough meat to make it worth your time. Not gonna lie, I am all for the action. This one performed well enough in that, so no complaints from me. Some new ideas thrown in were a tiny bit... abrupt for my taste, which I guess is not surprising in a book so short. Not much time to spend on world building and nothing else to set things up. Again, I approve.

Now we need to talk about two things that I am not wild about at all. I'm apologising already.

Mr. Patrick, please, get someone who checks your writing for teeny tiny inconsistencies. Once a character supposedly lost her mother, then she says father one time, then back to mother. Someone loses two fingers, then a chapter or two later he feels his finger, singular, he lost is hurting him. One character gets his face mauled and loses and eye, but later he has certain looks in his eyeS and all.
All these minors flaws can be solved with someone just reading the whole thing and paying attention. Honestly, the book could be much, much better with some careful eyes going through it. I'm nitpicky with those things and always notice them (god knows I have spent nights way back in time picking apart movies like LOTR for mistakes with my sister's ex-bf, annoying her to death). So yeah. There is that.

The other was the romance. Sure, I know usually folk storied and fairy tales don't really have the most nuanced and subtle love stories, but here I could have appreciated something. The main romance is Lonan and Branwen and I can't stand her. She is moody and colourless. Sure, there are explanations, but I saw absolutely nothing in her that would have made me buy Lonan's obsessive love for her. I saw no lovable thing at all. They were “meant to be”, but I wasn't sold on it. So yeah, that could have handled a bit more work, fleshing her out to seem something other than the most miserable person ever.

The final verdict is that this is a nice book that promises some pretty great stuff from the author in the future. I am planning on keeping an eye open for his new thing as they come out. Promising start. Not perfect at all, Mr. Patrick needs to polish his technique a bit here and there, but I think the talent is there and he seems like someone who has a possibly pretty great future ahead of him if he does that.

Good night and lock your doors carefully!