When a mudslide overwhelms the Rowan mining settlement, the only survivor is a three year old girl whose psychic powers alert everyone on her moon to the fact that she is trapped in a mud-covered skiff alone. Ann McCaffrey's novel, The Rowan, follows the growing up of a unique and powerful child into an isolated womanhood, where she finally meets that strong, sensitive man who saves her from loneliness, achieving a merging of the minds and perfect unity, etc. (Yeah, I got a bit impatient with the pacing and details of the story.)

Book Review - The Rowan
By Nola Redd

When a mudslide overwhelms the Rowan mining settlement, the only survivor is a three year old girl whose psychic powers alert everyone on her moon to the fact that she is trapped in a mud-covered skiff alone. Ann McCaffrey's novel, The Rowan, follows the growing up of a unique and powerful child into an isolated womanhood, where she finally meets that strong, sensitive man who saves her from loneliness, achieving a merging of the minds and perfect unity, etc. (Yeah, I got a bit impatient with the pacing and details of the story.)

I first read this book years and years ago, and frankly, I enjoyed it much more then. I still enjoy the story but the writing really seems lacking to me. It is hard to believe how many novels McCaffrey has sold. So much of the story is description, and it jumps around a lot. It feels as though we skim, skim, skim, oh wait here's a scene, skim, skim, skim some more. Her writing style is just very jerky.

One reason the story felt so jerky was that much was simply assumed, and then it took the author quite awhile to clarify the point, leaving the reader wondering if they missed something. Then there was the prediction-thing about guarding the guardian. After five years, I've never figured that out. Did they guard her, or was her death presentable? Or were they talking about Purza's unfortunate end? And I had made the mistake of reading Damia (the second book in the series) first, and so I found myself missing the interaction with Afra, the second in command. I'm sure if I had read the series in order, the point wouldn't have been so lacking. But given the definitive role he plays in the Rowan's life, you would have think he could have added a few more sentences, or interacted a bit more with the two main characters.

That said, kudos to an intriguing story - psychics running the shipping service in the solar system, and the loneliness that goes along with such an exalted position; an alien attack defeated by nonmechanical powers and women's intuition exceeding robotic sensors. Ultimately, an alien attack on the far-flung planet of Deneb helps the Rowan to meet her man, which we all know is the point of McCaffrey's novels. The evil is defeated, love conquers all, and the solar system is set right.

But I could have used a bit more detail in the process.

Nola Redd is an author on http://www.Writing.Com/ which is a site for Love Poetry. Visit her online bookstore, Redd's Read Books, to find something else great to read!

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