Really enjoyed the first book in the realm trilogy by SR Manssen

Disclosure: I know the author and don’t regularly read fantasy fiction. For these reasons I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the book – it’s fast paced, detailed (where it needs to be), and with a great sense of urgency and adventure. I liked and believed in the characters, and although they were not developed in great detail, the book really works. I found it hard to put down after the first couple of chapters. It reminded me of a recent teen fantasy fiction from renowned NZ author Maurice Gee. I’ll be recommending it to my teen and mature-reader 12yr old. Hopefully they don’t wait as long as I did to try fantasy fiction! – Karen Fehl

Published by Sharon Manssen

A fantasy fan since being read 'The Hobbit' by her father at the fireside at the age of six, she has been an avid bookworm her entire life. When the idea for her current trilogy popped into her head, there was never any doubt that it would be in the fantasy genre. Unfortunately, real life gets in the way, and writing has to fit around her full-time job at a global engineering consultancy and family life (husband and two young adult children). It took ten years to pen her first book, Medar, which was a finalist for the Tom Fitzgibbon Award in 2015 and was published in 2017. Her second book, Tyrelia was nominated in the Young Adult Fiction category in the 2019 Sir Julius Vogel Awards. Her third book, Golden City, is due out in 2021.