These Traveler Editions remain a great move on CrossGen Entertainment's part. It's the perfect balance between a digest size and the more traditional tradepaperback. It's too bad the story within doesn't appeal to me more. I find the story to be lacking in more grounded elements, but lucky for readers, there's little weakness to be found in the artwork. Greg Land's realistic, sleek and sexy style is not only the greatest asset of Sojourn, but one of the best in the entire CrossGen stable of talent.
Three hundreds years ago, a bloodthirsty warlord named Mordath and his troll army sought to conquer his world, but a hero named Ayden slew him with a single arrow. Today, Mordath has risen from the death and renewed his mission. Among those slaughtered are the husband and daughter of a warrior named Arwyn, who swears she will have her vengeance against Mordath. Now, Arwyn -- accompanied by the roguish Gareth and her dog, Kreeg -- must undertake a quest to find the five pieces of Ayden's arrow, as together, they are the key to defeating Mordath once again.
I became a fan of the Land/Geraci team with their work on Birds of Prey a few years ago, and here, their collaborative efforts remain stunning. In the past, they blew me away with sleek and sexy heroes, but I was more impressed here with the rich level of detail in the villains, namely the ugly trolls. The medieval settings are meticulously rendered as well, and there's a wonderfully dark atmosphere that looms over the book. The artwork is almost worth the price of admission on its own.
Marz has written some terrific action sequences in this story, but more important elements -- such as characterization -- are left undone. We never see Arwyn as anything but a driven warrior,, bent on vengeance, and that's something to which it is difficult to relate. Marz doesn't give the reader any down-to-earth elements or characters that can serve as his gateway into this world of magic and mayhem.
What Marz does do well here is to capture the epic quest. The Lord of the Rings flicks have shown there's an audience for such dungeons-and-dragons-esque stories, and Marz wisely taps into it. Unfortunately, I'm not quite so taken with the genre. Though the air of mystery that surrounds Ayden and his legend is intriguing, a story about a long search for mythic artifacts just doesn't hold my attention (unless Indiana Jones is involved somehow).
