Blog Tour and Review: Red Leaves of the Living Token

Title: Red Leaves and the Living Token
Author: Benjamin David Burrell
Series: Red Leaves
Publisher:Red Earth Press
Publication Date: May 3, 2012
How Received: For Review
Rate: 3.5

Summary (as quoted from Amazon): Doctors tell Raj that his son Emret won't survive his illness. As Raj struggles to prepare himself and Emret for the inevitable, he's confronted by Moslin, his son's nurse, who's been filling Emret's head with fairytales about heroic quests and powerful disease curing miracles. Emret now thinks that all he has to do is find the mythical Red Tree from the nurse's stories, and he'll live.
In an attempt to protect his son from further emotional damage, Raj asks Moslin to stay away from Emret. He returns hours later to find them both missing.
He searches the fairytales for clues to where they may have gone and stumbles upon stories that, strangely, he already knows. He saw them in a vision just before his son disappeared.

My thoughts:
Red Leaves and the Living Token is an interesting book.

The story follows three people: Valence, a complicated man who has a strong desire to hold the Token, a mysterious, glowing object that holds great power. Emret, a young boy with a serious illness that is destroying his life, and Emret’s father, Raj, who is just trying to make it through each day.

While Emret is in the hospital, his nurse, Moslin, tells him stories about something known as the Reds, or the Red Leaves, that could heal and cure his illness, and Emret starts to believe that there may be a way for him to survive. But Raj, knowing that the tale is based off fairy lore, is distressed at Moslin’s stories, believing that giving Emret that kind of hope is cruel and unfair, and soon demands that she stop telling the tale. When she refuses his wishes, Raj tells her that he will have her removed and request that she is replaced with another nurse.

On his next visit to the hospital, Raj finds not only his son missing, but the nurse as well. Unable to believe anything other than that Moslin has taken his son on a journey to find the mythical Red Tree from the stories, Raj goes after her, gaining not only knowledge about where they might have gone, but also the Token… And with it, new enemies. Enemies that will not only hesitate to destroy him, but also his son. As the stakes get higher, will Raj be able to overcome the obstacles?

I thought that this book was intriguing - it held some interesting, unique concepts, such as the fact that Raj is not a normal man (he’s a Zo, a fur covered creature, as is Emret), and neither is Moslin (she’s a Botann, a green limbed creature.) Everyone in this world is either a Botann, Zo, or Petra (a stone being).  However, I wasn’t as fond of the execution of the plot as I was with the ideas inside of it. At times I found myself re-reading passages to understand the story, and it was hard to follow the what was happening. If I'd been able to follow the plot better, I think I would've enjoyed it even more.
3.5/5
~Moujnir

This was only the 2nd stop in the Blog Tour - make sure to check out the rest of the stops on each of these cool blogs!