The Scar

By: Sergey Dyachenko, Marina Dyachenko, Elinor Huntington - translator

Narrated by: Jonathan Davis

Length: 15 hrs and 17 mins

Publisher's summary

Reaching far beyond sword and sorcery, The Scar is a story of two people torn by disaster, their descent into despair, and their re-emergence through love and courage.

Sergey and Marina Dyachenko mix dramatic scenes with romance, action and wit, in a style both direct and lyrical. Written with a sure artistic hand, The Scar is the story of a man driven by his own feverish demons to find redemption and the woman who just might save him. Egert is a brash, confident member of the elite guards and an egotistical philanderer. But after he kills an innocent student in a duel, a mysterious man known as “The Wanderer” challenges Egert and slashes his face with his sword, leaving Egert with a scar that comes to symbolize his cowardice. Unable to end his suffering by his own hand, Egert embarks on an odyssey to undo the curse and the horrible damage he has caused, which can only be repaired by a painful journey down a long and harrowing path.

Plotted with the sureness of Robin Hobb and colored with the haunting and ominous imagination of Michael Moorcock, The Scar tells a story that cannot be forgotten.

©2012 Marina and Sergey Dyachenko (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Rich, vivid, tactile prose, with a solid yet unpredictable plot—and an extraordinary depth and intensity of character reminiscent of the finest Russian literature." (Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review)

Unlikable Protagonist

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

The protagonist in this book was completely unlikeable and very little happened in the story. The writing was good, but I would not recommend this book.

What do you think your next listen will be?

I'm waiting for the next Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson, and Guy Gavriel Kay. Listen to them instead.

What does Jonathan Davis bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The narration was good

What character would you cut from The Scar?

The main character, and that's a problem.

A book in need of a story

This book went nowhere!! Depressing with no relief, disappointing beyond belief!!! A valuable lesson was learned, when reading reviews skip the first 15 and you will get the truth. Don’t waste your credit on this one!

Huge Disappointment

Would you try another book from the authors and/or Jonathan Davis?

I would not give the slightest consideration to any other writing of either of the two others.

Jonathan Davis made an adequate narrator. Everyone praised his reading with such vehemence that I expected something really excellent. The first minute and a half was truly excellent in terms of narration. The next 15 hours were exceptionally mediocre.

What was most disappointing about the authors’s story?

I had high hopes for this -- all the reviews said it was good. And yet.... and yet....

The entire thing was disjointed. It flowed like a bad fan-fiction: predictable, artificial, and tedious. And now -- having remembered that there were two authors on this travesty -- it makes all the more sense why nothing quite worked well. It read as if each author wrote one of the main characters and forced them together because it was on the To-Do List, not because there was any reason for it. The plot devolves into cliche tropes and unrealistic situations for the sake of having any kind of story to tell that wraps up neatly. Only it doesn't wrap up neatly. And there aren't even just a few loose ends. Half of what the story was building to is never explained or referenced again in the wake of getting the two protagonists together. Truly, after the first hour of listening, I just wanted both of them to die and spare me from having to listen to the next fourteen hours.

Which scene was your favorite?

The first minute and a half is excellent -- and only then because of the narrator. The rest of the book is painful and badly written.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from The Scar?

If I had been the editor, I would never have agreed to publish the book. It needs a serious re-write. If I could only be the editor of the audiobook.... can I say that I would cut everything after the first minute and a half?

Any additional comments?

I am extremely disappointed in this -- particularly after reading all the glowing reviews.

Dissatisfied with story but overall not terrible

The reviews had me thinking this would be an incredible story. I enjoy Russian literature and Ukrainian folklore and fantasies in general. This wasn't a bad listen at all, thanks to the narration (and my high hopes that trusted the writers were going to bring things around), but in the end it was a gigantic disappointment.

To get to the real meat of the story, you'll have to get past a significant part of the protagonist being excessively beastly--but once the story catalyst takes place, the plot does pick up considerably if you listen to it as a tale more than a novel. I'd highly recommend listening at 1.5x—the narrator is great and kept me from returning the book, but I found the pace to be far more listenable sped up. Otherwise, this story will be a DRAG. Strangely, although I found the plot to overall be disappointing and not really worth my time, the narration made the whole experience not terrible.

There were certainly a few significant holes/loose ends in the story, but I expect that this is only because the authors were planning to write two more books after this one. I was a little weirded out to find that this book is actually the 2nd in a 4-book series by the Dyachenkos, but the only one that's been translated into English so far. However, *technically* the story works as a stand-alone, and is strong in spite of the mystery of the Wanderer--whose identity we would know sooner had we read the first book in the series (which is about his story).

However, I don't recommend this unless you're a fan of their other works. (I am not—The Burned Tower is one of their most raved about and I ended up feeling totally misled into thinking it was going to end up being something deep...totally the opposite. A total waste of a great premise.) This story, too, felt like a waste. Avoid unless you know what you're getting into.