Publisher:
The Orbital Defense Corps, LLC

Publication Date:
12/25/2024

Copyright Date:
08/23/2021

ISBN:
979-8-9918223-0-5

Binding:
Paperback

U.S. SRP:
19.99

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OVERTWIXT

By R.L. Akers

IR_Star-black
IR Rating:
3.8
R.L. Akers’s OVERTWIXT is a promising debut with thoughtful worldbuilding and a sensitive plot, though it still suffers from shunting important developments to a forthcoming sequel.
Transported by chance to the magical realm of Overtwixt, four siblings must fulfill the destinies they’ve chosen if they ever hope to return home to Earth.

Nachton, Amélie, Cécilie, and Ewan are speeding through an airport with their parents when a seemingly chance encounter sends them far off-course. Instead of boarding their plane, they find themselves crossing a bridge into the magical realm of Overtwixt: a series of floating landmasses connected by bridges, both to one another and to other “real” worlds like Earth. When a mysterious guide compels each sibling to choose a destiny from a set of three options catered to that sibling alone, hope, fear, resentment, and love jockey for position with the overwhelming desire to find their way home again.

Taking its cues most clearly from The Chronicles of Narnia, R.L. Akers’s OVERTWIXT is a looser, bouncier, but arguably more mature take on several of the same themes. Most notably, the four protagonists show greater ambivalence about their own importance in the society of this newfound magical realm, the plot characterized to a greater degree by frustration and failure. (One is tempted to consider Lewis’s proximity to the relative moral clarity of the Second World War, in contrast to OVERTWIXT’s contemporariness.) There’s a greater focus on interiority than in Narnia: instead of any outright betrayal occasioned by external temptation, for instance, pride is what causes characters to fail. The only frustration is that these meaningful character arcs often feel incomplete; the protagonists have suffered some serious blows by the end of the text, but resolution has been deferred to sequels.

True to form for fantasy, OVERTWIXT boasts a well-imagined world rendered by both clever language and evocative illustrations (including maps of the interconnected landmasses and their bridges). The book-object itself is satisfyingly constructed, with page inserts and an appendix designed like notes hand-written by the character Nachton himself. The worldbuilding is rich but never overwhelming. A system of repeated word-roots allows a reader to quickly grasp the nature of Overtwixt’s many half-human races and which landmasses they inhabit. Though there is a glossary at the back, most of the terms are self-evident in use; several of the words are plain English with both a gloss and pronunciation notes, which will be helpful for younger readers adding to their vocabulary. Along with the focus on interiority noted above, these components help the novel punch above its weight as successful didactic literature.

It’s up to the next installment in the series to determine if this promise will bear out, but OVERTWIXT is a solid foundation with some real draw for both older readers and young ones looking for a rewarding challenge.

R.L. Akers’s OVERTWIXT is a promising debut with thoughtful worldbuilding and a sensitive plot, though it still suffers from shunting important developments to a forthcoming sequel.

[AUTHORS NOTE: the sequel to OVERTWIXT, Escape from Overtwixt, is releasing at the same time as the first book, and it completes the story arc.]

~Dan Accardi for IndieReader

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