Started: 21/06/21
Finished: 04/07/21
Spoilers: No
I was fortunate enough to get an early copy of the book, so please note that the faults I mention in my review may still change before publication. Thank you to Angry Robot and Netgalley for the review copy.
I was really excited to read this one after reading the blurb. It's a fast-paced, entertaining read with a lot going for it. That being said, I don't think the writing style was for me, but this is by no means a bad book, it's actually really great, I just didn't connect the way I hoped. This review ended up longer than I expected, but I have a lot of thoughts.
Characters
I’m a big fan of any anti-hero narrative and love seeing more and more being published these days. I really like that I couldn't trust any of them and they were betraying each other, even though they were working together. It added an extra layer of tension.
I can't remember if it's ever actually stated how old the characters are. Either I missed it, or it's just not there. I assumed they were in their 50s/60s, but some confirmation would've been cool.
Dalia - Awesome character. Love seeing a female character in such a prominent position of power and feared badassery. Although I kind of didn't like that she had to give up her position in the very begenining because she was pregnant. Like, women can have babies and also careers. Just think too often in stories women are made to give up their lives in order to have children, and I can't help but eyeroll a little at the trope. But each to their own.
Maeven - We probably see Maeven more than anyone else in this book as we follow her during the character collection process. She's an interesting, self-serving character who I think deep down has a soft side. I didn’t necessarily like her, but she was still a great character despite that.
Lorimer - I liked him, but didn't really connect with him in any way, and I found his dialogue a little stilted and theatrical. Probably done purposely because he’s a really old vampire lord, but it made him feel like an over-dramatic vampire caricature.
Tiarnach - Among all these serious, brooding characters, he was some much needed comic relief. He immediately became my favourite and I felt he had the most natural sounding dialogue for them all. His humour and quick one-liners were exactly what the story needed up until his arrival. However, as the story went on, I feel like his quick wit degenerated into unintelligent vulgarity for the sake of it. I like a bit of vulgar humour if it’s funny but Tiarnach’s was a little overkill in the end. Perhaps too many references to fucking people with his big, hard cock, just saying.
Verena - A quietly intelligent woman who, among such big and brash personalities, got a little lost amongst the noise. Though I think out of them all, she probably had the most honour and humanity.
Amogg - I really liked the pairing of Amogg and Tiarnach whenever they were together. They had some great banter. I love when a story is a little more tongue in cheek and I definitely got those vibes from any Amogg/Tiarnach scenes. They almost reminded me of Legolas and Gimli. An unlikely friendship between enemies.
Jerak - For nearly half the book we're told how monstrous and disgusting the alchemist is, and for a longer time all we're shown is a chipper, enthusiastic little man. While I enjoy this interesting juxtaposition of an overly happy murderer, in the end it felt like the characters were telling me how to feel about Jerak when I was seeing nothing to back up their opinions. Which got a little annoying. Granted, we do see Jerak is glorious action eventually, but I think the hate and horror piled on him in the beginning was a little overkill. If he'd been left as more of a mystery I might not have felt so irrationally angry with the other characters. It wasn't until over half through that I started to see the Jerak they spoke of and I started dislike him as much as them. Couldn't give a shit about the stuff he does to humans, but I didn't like what he did to the pigs.
So after spending an entire book with these characters, and on reflection, I didn’t actually like any of them and was quite relived to see the back of them. Maybe this was done on purpose. They’re all villains, after all, and had very few redeeming qualities about them.
Plot
This is going to appeal to so many people. On the face of it, the plot is a blood-drenched action adventure novel with a colourful cast of characters.
Think Magnificent Seven meets Kings of the Wyld meets Suicide Squad meets R.E.D. And if that doesn't sound insanely cool, I don't know what does.
Basically, extremely dangerous retired villains getting back together after 40 years to defend a one-horse town against a fanatical army. It was this idea that instantly had my attention. The plot, on the whole, delivers exactly what it promises and you can't say fairer than that.
I did have a few plot hole questions in the beginning, however.
The pacing was a little extreme. The first 50% was slow and the final 50% was fast. In general, I just think the book could’ve been condensed. Given what actaully happens in the books, 400 pages might be too many.
In that first 50% of the book, we just have Maeven going around collecting the characters ready for war, which is fine, I do like this kind of story arc (I enjoyed it in Kings of the Wyld), but the problem here, I think it just went on for too long. When we all already know the characters will agree to come together to fight the war, getting those characters together doesn't need to be 50% of the book. It probably all could've been wrapped up in a couple of chapters, giving us more time to focus on the main point of the plot.
Setting
On the face of it, the world feels vast, I just don't know how vast. A little underdeveloped and not explored in enough depth for me to picture it, or for it to feel real. Place names are given but I literally know nothing about these places or what they look like, or how far they are in context to other places. Like, how long did it take Maeven to travel from place to place? Not that I want to see all this tedious travel in the book, but a line or two explaining how long it took to get around wouldn't been helpful. I think they only had a few weeks before the army arrives and five different locations to get to before then.
I'd like to say more about the setting but I really don't know enough about it to go into any detail.
But what I did know about the world I thought was well written. I did find it very interesting that in this world, orcs are gender neutral until they choose a gender. I also thought it was cool that there weren't just humans in this world, but also sorts of races, including orcs, vampires, and ant people known as hivers. Really gives a sense of how vast the world is.
Writing Style
The writing is totally fine, though not to my taste. It seems to favour telling over showing a little too much for me. It made it almost difficult to picture things in my head. I wanted to see things for myself, rather than being told how people felt or what things looked like.
There's random, out of place, moments of head-hopping. The story will be entirely in third-limited, and then suddenly it turns omniscient in a "little did they know" sense, which was quite jarring for me. Surely you can't just jump from third-limited to omniscient in a single sentence. That's got to be breaking some kind of writing rule, right?
The narrative lacked clarity at times. There were a few moments where I stumbled on who was being spoken about because just he or she was used rather than a character name. Something like this is an easy fix and removes all confusion, especially when you have so many characters being mentioned.
Also, another proofreading wouldn't hurt it any. I noticed a few instances where words were missing or extra words added, spelling mistakes, echoes, head hopping, and such. It's fine, we're all human, but there were a few more here than the average novel. But again this is an arc copy and not a finished copy of the book.
Final Impression
It really was a lot of fun. I think my issue lies in my own personal tastes. I prefer character driven over plot driven stories, and even though this book is packed full of colourful characters, I still felt like the plot was the strongest point, and the overall driving force of the story.
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