Get Your Copy The Guardian Of Secrets And Her Deathly Pact Written And Illustrated By Jana Petken Released Through Electronic Format

consider The Guardian of Secrets an informative historical novel with a grand sweeping narrative of a family that is primarily affected by the evils of one man and one war.
Notwithstanding its arduous length aboutpages, this very absorbing book is difficult to ignore, The characters are very believable, and the settings from the English farmland to the war torn country of Spain can be experienced through the author's excellent narrative.
Although I noticed a few errors in the edition I read, they were few and caused little distraction in this captivating volume.
Regardless of the extremely artistic way in which this book was presented, I had some concerns that stem, essentially, from the writer's style which included the use of some trite literary phrases, some repetitiveness, and the occasional delay in expressing a point.
In addition, I was personally others may disagree displeased regarding the decision made by the granddaughter at the end of the book you will have to read it to understand to what I am eluding.
Despite those minor drawbacks, I genuinely recommend this book, You will not be sorry, I so enjoyed this book I could not put it down, I remember when I finished reading "Gone with the Wind" many years ago, that I cried when I finished it, feeling that I would never find another book as good as that one.
Of course I did, many times, but that feeling was with me as I tried to slow down on the last few pages of Jana Petken's book "The Guardian of Secrets and her Deathly Pact".


The history of the time is scrupulously researched, The Spanish Civil War has always been a bit of a mystery to me, although I have read many factual books and a couple of novels about it.
This book really helped me to understand the upheaval there must have been for the families involved, sometimes brother against brother, etc.


Jana's characters are so finely drawn, I felt that I knew them and had met them, I judge books by "Is it worth a second read" Definitely yes, after a few weeks or months I will read it again, as I devoured it voraciously the first time.
Well done Jana Petken, you have fulfilled your duties as an author, to inform and thoroughly entertain! The Guardian of Secrets sent me on a journey into the earlyth Century with characters I grew to love or hate.
The descriptive, captive way, in which the author, Jana Petken wrote, left me feeling as though I were in the story.

The well researched and harrowing account of a civil war where family members fought against each other was brilliantly portrayed.
Add that to the decisions these characters made, the way , in which they grew from these decisions, the evil of Joseph Dobbs, and the passion of Maria and Carlos, and you have a well rounded, excellent piece of historical fiction.
If you love historical books, you won't find better than this,

Jana Petkens The Guardian of Secrets: And Her Deadly Pact is a massive sprawling piece of historical fiction that is a stunning and thoroughly epic achievement.

From the opening prologue where a laborious and painstaking final journal entry is scrawled in the present day by a character recounting a life of secrets, sorrows, trials and tribulations, we then launch back to where this gargantuan saga of a now vastly prosperous family begins, way back toin Kent, England.

Downtrodden heroine Celia Merrill Dobbs should be living her dream, she is born of privilege with fortune at her disposal and is only relatively recently married to the goodlooking Joseph, but of course, scratch beneath the surface of this apparently perfect facade, and one will find that the boorish drunken Joseph is but a monster wearing a mans face.
The love that may have drawn them blissfully together and been apparent on their wedding day has long since shrivelled up and died, and Joseph reveals what lurks inside him instead.

Thus begins this gripping dramatic literary accomplishment, one that stretches from these beginnings in England in the earlys all the way to Spain and the Civil war which occurs some twenty odd years later, carrying right through to the present day which both initiates and culminates the lengthy tale.

Petken writes with a fluid and captivating style, and intricately fills scenes with impeccable detail, so while The Guardian of Secrets: And Her Deadly Pact is a remarkably long book it never feels like it, it is populated by a host of entirely involving characters, though the reasons for them being so engrossing are not always pleasant.
A prime example of this is Joseph Dobbs himself, a man riddled with hatred and despicable habits, and his villainous attributes and actions set him apart from some of the more gentle souls of the piece.

Considering the enormous scope of the book and the protracted timeline of it, naturally there are a great rollercoaster ride of moments throughout, the soaring highs tempered by the devastating lows, and from tragedy to triumph, despair and desolation to touching romances set to a backdrop of war it sweeps, managing to retain interest throughout the duration.
It is neither solely a drama, nor a straightforward historical saga, a romance story or a tragic tale, it is all of the above, in a successful melange combining elements from each component to create an opus that will remain with you long after you have finished reading.

This has been one of the best books that I have read in a long time! I am not exaggerating when I say that my life came to a standstill till I finished the book.
I can only marvel at the amount of research the author must have done, It is a long book, but so well written that I found myself racing through it to find out what would happen next.


Her characters are brilliant, each one so well thought out, and beautifully developed, The story itself is in turns romantic, horrific, enchanting and as a whole, sublime, It had me close to tears very often and dont get me started on the goose bumps,

I have to say Jana Petken, you are truly a brilliant writer! Please write more! This was a marvelous experience!
I could not put this book down.
I mainly read spirituality books so it was something different for me, I read this book and thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it is not the sort of book I usually read.
I found myself rooting for the success or demise of many of the The Guardian of Secrets and Her Deathly Pact's characters, which I take as a sign that the characters are well developed and brought to life.
When I first looked at reading this book, I wasn't sure that I'd enjoy it enough to want to review.
It's not my usual genre and with it being so long, I worried I would lose interest, I am happy to say that I was wrong, so VERY wrong, This book is great! Awesome! and really easy to get into and enjoy, The story is riveting and I found myself wishing for things to hurry up and for me to read faster.
I spent nights telling myself "just one more chapter" even though it was late and I had to get some sleep.
A real page turner that had me desperate to get to the end,

Jana Petken is a highly talented author who knows how to tell a good story, She hooks you within the first chapter and then you are desperate to read the snippets of information in each following chapter.
You will laugh, you will cry, you will be a complete slave to this book until you reach the end and then, you'll want to read another by this great author.
So do not be put off by it's length, there is a reason it's so long and it is packed full of plot, information and characters that you will grow to love and hate.


Even as I reached the ending, and figured there could be no more surprises, another few popped up and I was blown away with how well the story was crafted.
A great read, highly recommended for those who love historical fiction, but really for anyone who loves a damn good book! I could practically write a novellength review for this epic.
Relax I wont. An overview: the novel is a family saga that begins in England and travels to Spain, spanning several generations, overarching the Spanish Civil War.


Ms. Petken handles characterisation deftly, though Id like to have seen Josephs devolution into the villain he is from the getgo FYI, his comeuppance is great, but the sneaky author tricked me a couple times! And great courtroom scene, BTW.
. With a huge cast and the rich historical backdrop, keeping these characters straight and well delineated must have been a monumental task.


Personally, I might have stripped down much of the text there is some telling of emotions rather than showing.
But contrary to popular opinion, this is not a horrific crime, and greater economy might not have served the story, whereas Ms.
Petkens style seems to aptly suit it,

While the research that went into this work must have been enormous, thats not the impressive part, No, the impressive part is Ms, Petkens distillation of that research into a comprehensive and comprehendible fictional narrative that makes the reader feel the lives of these people, whether sinner or saint, villain or heroine.
Historical fiction is my first love, I read widely and I'm always looking for new authors, I would like to say that The Guardian of Secrets has won me over, but I can't, My first problem with it was that it could have been set in the present day, To write historical fiction you have to evoke the past, but I got not one bit of that here, Even the war struck me as off key,

I don't know if this novel was self published, but I'm guessing it was, A good editor would have worked with Petken to carve this novel down to a reasonable size and that would have helped enormously with what I can only call a terribly plodding, overwrought plot.


It's really important in a novel of this length to generate some tension and repeatedly but here everything is laid out in painful detail when telling less would have engaged the reader more.
The characterizations are shallow the terrible abusive husband is all bad, black as sin, murderous, The wife is blindly in love, frustrating in her extreme naive view of the world, and truly the only word I can come up with boring.


Generally I just don't review novels that don't work for me, because often I recognize that a particular novel is well put together, but not my cup of tea.
That's not the case here, I suppose I felt compelled

to write a review because of the absolutely glowing reviews, I'm at a loss, I confess, I just don't get it,

.