“Shades of Rust and Ruin” written by A.G. Howard is an average book that plays with preconceived notions from the reader, while falling on its face at the most crucial steps. The book is an urban fantasy novel with a splash of romance and body horror.
The book follows Nix, a struggling artist who works part time at her uncle’s bakery. Uncle Thatch, a kind man who tries his best to care for Nix since her parents died. And Clarey, an aspiring makeup and mask designer who has a pet dog.
The main plot revolves around Nix struggling with depression on Halloween, because she perceives that her sister’s death could have been avoided. Her uncle has attempted to help her while being bound to secrecy. The day before Halloween, Nix tries to help her friend Clarey improve his costume, however she stumbles upon the delivery man arguing with her uncle. This is where the fantasy elements arise with a two-headed cat doll that causes Nix to pass out, only to wake later in her bed dazed and confused.
All seems normal on Halloween until Nix discovers her uncle’s disappearance and rushes to save him, Clarey and his dog at her side. Together they run through a world that mimics Nix’s art, however the denizens, steampunk fairies, wish to capture the trio for nefarious ends. On the way, Clarey and Nix start to fall for each other even though he dated Nix’s sister before her death.
Eventually, Nix is forced to stand alone against the Goblin king only to have her focus redirected. She is given an offer to save everyone she cares about in exchange for destroying a massive computer that controls reality, only to discover the machine was her sister all along. She sacrifices herself to save her long lost sister and becomes trapped while everyone else runs free.
The first chapter of the book is wonderful: paragraphs are a reasonable length, good characterization, and everything is described with enough detail for your imagination to run wild. The second chapter is the complete opposite with walls of text causing my eyes to glaze over. The book stays like that until halfway through, where the paragraphs returned to the style at the beginning of the book.
I feel that the book needed another draft for it to clean up the unnecessary wording. If that problem was solved the book would be wonderful. I wouldn’t recommend this book, but if you are a fan of the author, it is a good read.
