This book was a slow burn for me. Taking place in a brilliantly imagined world, filled warring Guilds, mind powered war machines, war eagles and much more, we find ourselves following one particular Guild, The Hawkspurs.
Through the eyes of the four POV characters, Rosomon, and her children, Conall, Fulren and Tyreta, we get to explore much of this world, its peoples and its demons. It is Fulren who took centre stage for me. I was wondering where the story was going, when it suddenly got very violent - in a library of all places - and from there the story really kicked on.
I found myself drawn into the characters without realising I had been. Conall with the army on the frontier, battling his desire to succeed on his own merit and not his family name. Tyreta on a far off island, falling in with the natives and discovering things about herself she never knew existed. And Fulren, whose live is turned upside down. Sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit, robbed of his sight, shipped off to an alien city, his is the story that is the the real driving plot running through the book.
As with all good stories, we find out much of our characters past through their present, and even learn a few things that they don't yet know. It's a long book, detailed, with really well fleshed out characters set in a world that was refreshing and nothing quite like what I had encountered in fantasy before. And it's a story with legs, by no means burnt out at the end, and I'm very much looking forward to book two.
*I'll end with a shout out for the narration. Listened to this via audible and with a full cast narration it was superb, really adding another layer to the story*
Comentarios