This is emotionally charged grimdark fantasy at its finest. L. E. Garrison has delivered again, and surpassed all my expectations. Do you need any convincing beyond that dazzling cover? Well, pages of deranged rambling follow nonetheless.
Having thoroughly enjoyed the author’s last book - Acts of Deicide I jumped at the chance to read an ARC of this series. While the two books are not connected by plot, I thought I knew what I was getting into. Boy, was I wrong?
I expected the dark gruesome bits - this is grimdark after all, and Garrison is not an author who holds back. I also expected the fleshed out characters and emotional depth. I got those. But this book was so much more.
We start out with what seems like a well-trodden story of two estranged lovers on two sides of the border. But it soon transforms into a far more elaborate affair.
If a mountain could speak, it wouldn’t be half as immense and endless as that voice. If the Abyss that encircled everything could open its throat and share its thoughts in the language of men, it wouldn’t have been nearly so dark and sinister.
Endarion and Estrid are the characters we spend most of our time with.
Endarion is a complicated man with a tainted past, recovering from a failed mission that left him in captivity of a dark creature in another planet. His fame as the Iron Wolf haunts the conflicted, tormented man he is now.
Estrid is a rising commander on the other side, chased out from her homeland. Her command over her magic is strenuous, and as a turncoat she is always the subject of suspicion among her peers.
They are both flawed characters, their lives an entangled quagmire of mistakes, decisions forced onto them and conflicted feelings for each other.
Fate had made his decision for him, it seemed, circumstance tugging at the thin cord of his patriotism and steering him in defence of his murderous cousin, rather than to the aid of the woman he’d loved more than half his life.
The political landscape is extremely chaotic and complex. As you might expect, there is a ton of political conniving, backstabbing and layers and layers of deception.
With every chapter, we discover new players pulling the strings from background. This is not a story centered around a single grand idea. Embrace the mayhem.
he opened his eyes and the illusion sundered like a broken bone
Endarion Boratorren’s other-worldly encounter with a demonic entity in another world has left him crippled. He would lived out the rest of his life in obscurity, if not for the strange murder of another member of the Boratorren family - Novissa Boratorren, who plays the very prominent role of a warmaster.
The murder investigation soon devolves into a ploy for large scale war, and it becomes evident that Novissa’s death is not an isolated incident. The Boratorren family is on the whole at risk, and gets deeply entangled in a war that is likely to ruin it completely.
It sounds like half the entire world is involved in the plot to destroy our family
I loved the myriad complexities that keep popping in with every page. The tangle of threats, the poorly balanced power structures, the doomed decorated title of “Paramount General” thurst upon Endarion - loved it all.
Endarion’s depiction was the biggest highlight for me, the portrayal of his conflicted wavering personality was just magnificent, and he is likely to remain as one of the best grimdark protagonists in my heart. In some ways, he reminded me of C. L. Schneider’s Ian Troy and T. J. Mckay’s Braddock Tuzzein.
Estrid was also incredibly relatable, her passion, the maelstrom of conflicting emotions for Endarion, especially the final moments of indecision made this book such a wonderful experience.
Have the courtesy to deny it, at least. Tell me I’m wrong and the Iron Wolf is capable of love
Everyone I love is a target. Everyone I love dies or is chased away
While yes, there is a love story that forms the core of this story, I wouldn’t advise picking this up unless you have an apetite for grim violence. When it comes to the torture and gore, this book is visceral. The battles are gruesome, as are the circumstances leading up to them, and their aftermath.
My cold dead heart flared at the way the author uses the scenes of violence to connect past and present. Sometimes through recollections, sometimes hallucinations, other times dreams. The whole premise of father and daughter having shared nightmares of torture - brilliant.
The stench of death formed a thick, rancid smog. In the distance, he saw yet more fat pillars of black smoke. If he drowned out the sounds of his own soldiers and focused, he heard the echoes of screams even through his helmet, the eerie ghosts of people not yet dead.
I am something of an epic fantasy recluse. Classic epic fantasy where we start from the farm boy’s childhood and slog through ten chapters of world-building and character-development before the plot begins, is something that simply doesn’t work for me anymore. Life is short, get sh*t rolling - fast! This book does that.
The plot unfolds rapidly at multiple fronts, and the number of concepts and characters introduced feel a bit overwhelming at first. But there is enough handholding and cues to keep you tethered. Don’t worry if you can’t keep track of everything in the first third of the book. They all connect well. There is also a glossary at the end which I recommend making use of.
If you are a pet lover, you’d also likely appreciate the author’s love of dogs shining through her writing.
Speak about my dog like that again and I’ll have him rip your bastard throat from your bastard neck
The bits of scifi elements came as a pleasant surprise.
Beyond the theocracies of the past (which would be familiar to readers of Garrison’s past book) and their technological marvels, we see Stargate-esque Atlas gates connecting different planets, flying thunderships, machine-propelled cities that stride through grasslands. Some of the world-building elements reminded me of Bill Adam’s Godsblood Tragedy, which also I highly recommend.
And no, having magic doesn’t feel like a cheat code as it often does in books that try to combine tech and sorcery. Here everything has a cost, and being a magic user paints a target on your forehead.
The aasiur pressed against her, bloating her, filling her as water in drowning lungs. On shaky legs she rose, arms raised, palms flattened. An image of a firestorm dominated her mind’s eye, an unconscious thought she’d not conjured herself. It sharpened until it seared itself into her vision.
Besides Estrid and Endarion, I loved Sephara’s and Tali’s PoV as well. Sephara was fantastic in both her resourcefulness and restraint. While we don’t see Tali’s full potential in the first book which leaves many tangents open, she obviously is poised to play a pivotal role in the series.
she knew her father was in the business of making war, and supposed that, as soon as he’d captured a landscape for her, he ravaged it with his army and ensured no one else could ever admire it again.
The secondary characters are interesting too, like Iana waiting in the garden to lure in the assassin and the secretive leader of the Heaven’s Paramours. Absolutely loved to see each character forming a slightly different perception of the others based on the information they have and their lived experience.
Her delicate face, once open and welcoming, now radiated coldness. Her large eyes, in the past alight with humour, were splinters of ice as she regarded him with a chilling indifference.
Besides the plot and characters, Garrison’s presentation is a joy throughout - the dialogs are frameworthy, the prose vivid and beautiful, and pretty much every aspect felt extremely well thought. In all its tangled chaotic messiness, the story felt like it was written just for me.
Needless to see, I am eagerly looking forward to what comes next. I am dying to discover what the devious immortals are truly planning and what’s next in store for Tali.
Pride is all we have left when we’re denied your name.