About

Starship's Mage is the first book in the Starship's Mage series written by Glynn Stewart.

Starship's Mage book cover

Blurb

In a galaxy tied together by the magic of the elite Jump Magi, Damien Montgomery is a newly graduated member of their number.

With no family or connections to find a ship, he is forced to service on an interstellar freighter known to be hunted by pirates.

When he takes drastic action to save the "Blue Jay" from their pursuers, he sets in motion a sequence of events beyond his control - and attracts enemies on both sides of the law!

Starship's Mage was originally released as five separate episodes.

Review

Overall, I enjoyed the plot and the concept of mages enabling interstellar travel. We don't get to see how Mages learn and graduate. They have different specializations, magical strength, etc. Damien wants to be a starship mage and has some special talents (though I wasn't sure how that wasn't spotted/reported by his peers and teachers before graduation). Knowledge and tools available for Mages were controlled by those in power, which led to some interesting twists in this book.

Writing was easy to follow, except some of the science heavy descriptions. Characters were okayish, not much to praise about how they were written. And this book really needs another round of editing — at minimum to remove typos, words with similar meanings next to each other, missing punctuation, etc. My own writings have such problems too, so I probably shouldn't be pointing fingers.

Also, as mentioned in the blurb, this was originally written as five episodes. Would have been better if reminders at the start of episodes were edited out to read better as a single book.

My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟☆ (3.5 stars, bumped up to 4 since it is self-published and author's early work)

What others are saying

From Zad's review on goodreads:

I started to read this series because I like Glynn Stewarts Castle Federation series, and his writing style. I had my doubts about merging magic and fantasy with sci-fi and technology. I must say that I was thoroughly surprised.

From Rachel's review on goodreads:

The world-building was definitely the best part of this novel. As a piece of science fiction with elements of fantasy, this story reminded me a bit of Star Wars. Unfortunately, the characters were very weak, particularly the females. Overall, it was a decent escapist read.

Bingo

/r/Fantasy/ 2022 bingo categories:

  • Set in Space (HM)
  • Self-Published OR Indie Publisher
  • No Ifs, Ands, or Buts