The Ill-Made Mute

Written by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

Narrated by Kim Bretton

Dive into worlds as captivating as Tolkien's Middle-earth, with 'The Ill-Made Mute'. Experience the same immersive awe you felt reading 'The Lord of the Rings', through tales rich in wonder and adventure. Embrace the journey into extraordinary realms. Feel the magic anew. Your escape begins on page 1.
The stormriders land their winged stallions on the airy battlements of Isse Tower. Far below, the superstitious servants who dwell in the fortress's lower depths tell tales of wicked creatures inhabiting the world outside - a world they have only glimpsed. Yet it is the least of the lowly, a mute, scarred, and utterly despised foundling, who dares to scale the tower, sneak aboard a windship and then dive from the sky.
But the hearth-side tails are all true. Unhuman wights are real in all their legions. They haunt every pool, every turn in the road, threatening and tormenting travellers. A perilous journey begins.
The Ill-made Mute Special Edition is revised and extended with extras, including Dart-Thornton's introduction and fragments of her early writing.
"Not since Tolkien's 'The Fellowship of the Ring' fell into my hands have I been so impressed by a beautifully spun fantasy."
~Andre Norton, Grand Master of Science Fiction.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Leaves of Gold Press
• Release date: May 15, 2024
• ISBN: 9780645948776

Cecilia Dart-Thornton

Cecilia Dart-Thornton is the author of numerous bestselling fantasy novels, notably the Bitterbynde Trilogy, which includes The Ill-Made Mute, The Lady of the Sorrows, and The Battle of Evernight. The daughter of an architect and an academic, Dart-Thornton holds a bachelor of arts degree and a post-graduate diploma of education from Monash University. Having started out as a schoolteacher, she became a full-time writer in 2000, after her work was “discovered” on the Internet and brought to print by a New York publishing house. She is a strong supporter of animal rights and her interests include music, the fine arts—particularly Pre-Raphaelite paintings—and edible gardening. Visit her online at www.dartthornton.com and www.leavesofgoldpress.com.

Reviews for The Ill-Made Mute

[altheaann · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Although it's definitely not "serious" literature, I couldn't help liking this book. A mix of original high fantasy, Celtic legend, and escapist romance come together in a dazzling – if not all that substantial – mélange.
A youth, face hideously scarred and bearing other marks of violence, is found unconscious and brought to Isse Tower, a Stormrider's outpost. Deformed and ugly, and suffering from amnesia, the youth is reviled and works as a drudge – the lowest of the low. Driven to escape on one of the floating skyships, an adventure is in the offing - involving pirates, hidden treasure, dangerous wastelands filled with fantastic dangers, brigands, and, of course, a mysterious and gorgeous love-interest.
Dart-Thornton's language is full of rich and gorgeous details. The reader gets to know precisely what each character might be wearing, how rooms are furnished, etc. This might seem annoying – but she makes it work. She also works in a wealth of old folktales (with a bibliography of their sources at the end.)

[alissa1-7 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Very nice, with an original main protagonist and very interesting characters. The story is compelling, the world-building solid and there are many delightful details of folklore and story-telling. Epic fantasy at its purest, with quests, treasures and all. Unfortunately, the pace is a bit slow -particularly and the beginning, when the reader absorbs a lot of information along with the amnesiac protagonist- and too much care in descriptions (and sometimes endless lists of objects and foods, or long songs) makes for a difficult reading at times, but on to the next book!

[meow9th · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I really disliked this book because of the long-winded yet irrelevant descriptions and stories-within-stories, slow-moving plot, unsympathetic characters and trite, unbelievable ending.The descriptions were torturous in their detail and use of specific vocabulary; reading them were as bad as reading my worst textbook. Some amount of detail and topic-specific vocabulary (e.g., sailing jargon) adds verisimilitude; Dart-Thornton takes it way, way beyond what is optimal.The stories-within-stories (e.g., told in the kitchen by the servants after the workday is over) were pretty much irrelevant to world-building, entertainment, or any other purpose I can think of. Pretty much all they established was that the world-building drew from Celtic/Gaelic faerie mythology. You want a really good treatment stories-within-stories, read The Orphan's Tale duology by Catherynne Valente.

[lismb_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Love this book. I didn't know anything about it when I started reading it. Now I look forward to the other books in this series. Delightful

[reading_fox · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Gently appealing. Another new austrailian fantasy writer's debut novel, that is worth looking out for.Once upon a time in a distant continent the races of the fae and ancestors of man lived in harmony. Some ancient tragedy caused disquiet between the fair folk who left, and the fae who faded and divided into the seelie and unseelie wights, left to trouble mankind. Some 1000 years later, after a kingdom formed, splintered and remerged, a child arrives. Discovered facedown in a clump of the most noxious paradoxis ivy the face is horrendously disfigured. The the shock appears to have taken the child's voice for it is mute and memoryless. Raised as the lowliest of servants in a King's way station, the nameless child soon manages to learn more about the world. And as it's situation doesn't improve the child decides to escape and take it's chances with the seelie infested wilds - even if this means leaving it's sole joy: the wonderful flying horses of the tower. An intriguing blend of Irish, Scottish and Faerie lore. At times the descriptions run overly long, but generally the prose is gracefully slow and takes delight in well crafted world. If I'm going to be picky it suffers from some of the normal problems of the 1st book of fantasy trilogy: The world exists of only one small continent, the hero embarks on a long Quest Journey travelling through unusual locals and having adventures that have little relevance, characters appear and fade away as the hero passes through, there are large chunks of exposition to get the reader up-to-date with the world's history, and of course much of the plot and details of the hero remain unexplained. However many of these are much less badly done than in many similar works, and we are spared the usual assortment of companions. The characters are well drawn, even if lacking in depth at times, the problems associated with muteness and disfigurement of the hero are realistically - if somewhat easily habituated- described. The world is great, a very imaginative blend, with a lot of wilderness and not much farmed land to support he populations, and a vast population of wights seem to make normal life very difficult - but again intriguingly depicted. Sometimes the boundaries from one landscape to another seemed a bit coarse, but again it's a minor issue. The appeal lasts throughout, with plenty of unexplained hooks left to set the catch for the next installment. I'm looking forward to it........................................................................................

[stubbyfingers_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I really, really didn't like this book. It was a struggle for me to finish. The only reason I did was because I read a review saying they liked the romance in this book and I'm a sucker for romance. But the romance here is very, very minimal, so don't let that be your reason for reading this!'I'm not a writer, but once when I was in high school I decided to write a really long story. A few pages in I got bored and switched the story line completely, mid-story. A few pages after that, I changed it again. In a few more pages I changed it again, and a few pages after that I gave up and killed off all the characters. Needless to say, that was an awful story I wrote. This book reminds me very much of that story. There are three distinct sections of this book in which the characters are completely different (including the main character!) and even the world is completely different. It just doesn't work. I found the world-building to be very interesting in the first section and was disappointed when it disappeared never to return.Another complaint is a definite feeling that the author wrote this with a thesaurus open on the desk beside her. She used very few words I didn't understand, she just used lots that barely fit the situation. I found this to be annoying.The only good thing I have to say about this book is the way the author incorporated actual folklore from Scotland, Wales and the Orkney and Shetland Islands. The presence of creatures from this lore was the only constant in this book. This was great, except it got old really fast. Strange malevolent or mischievous magical creatures show up many times every day in the characters' lives, and despite the characters' absolute terror of these creatures, they rarely do any actual harm. Boring.

[pitcherbooks · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An enthralling read. Couldn't put it down. Wish the rest of the series were even one quarter as good :-(

[epeeblade · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed this first book. I liked the set up, the main character and how it ended. However, the rest of the trilogy tanks, and I cannot in good conscience recommend a book that ends with such a terrible conclusion.

[felius_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I picked up a second-hand copy of this some time ago after beeing told "you must read this book". It was apparently critically acclaimed, but few people I know had read it. My wife tried to read it first (as I was already working through a stack) and gave not without getting very far through it.The book starts off slowly, and the florid prose takes some adjustment. Scenes are frequently described in great visual detail, in language that may require you to occasionally reach for a dictionary (and I consider myself to have a pretty decent vocabulary at hand).However this really is a book that rewards persistence, as it presents an extremely well realised world and picks up pace toward the end, leaving you with a climax that should have you reaching for the second in the series.The world in which the events of the book take place is not really your standard fantasy fare, and draws mostly on the mythology of the British Isles for its fantastic elements. However I was particularly pleased to see the subtle inclusion of Australian fauna and flora in descriptions of the wilderness through which the protagonist and her companions travel.The protagonist has the genre conventions of a past shrouded in mystery of which they themselves are unaware, but the reliance on wit and determination rather than swordplay or magic is refreshing.It took me a while to get into this, but by the end I was desperate for more. I eagerly look forward to reading the second volume in the series.