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Showing posts from August, 2022

The Warrior Prophet: Book Review

I just finished reading The Warrior Prophet, the second book in The Prince of Nothing trilogy. This book picks up right where The Darkness That Comes Before left off and follows three consecutive marches south by the Holy War, as they move inexorably closer to Shimeh, their ancient holy land. What follows is another stunning entry in the series, as the Holy War is embroiled in multiple climactic battles, infected by a manipulative third party who is taking advantage of the war for his own agenda, and internal political conflicts that are inherent to any war. This book is a step up from the last in terms of pacing, character, worldbuilding, and twists, providing compelling motivation to move right on into the next book. No Spoilers Characters As characters are the most important part of the story, I will start by talking about that aspect. For each of them, I think they have been developed in interesting ways, or they are allowed to shine in amazing ways. Achamian goes through hell and

The Darkness That Comes Before: Book Review

I just finished reading The Darkness That Comes Before, by R. Scott Bakker. This is the first installment in The Prince of Nothing trilogy—which is, in turn—the first series within the larger Second Apocalypse series. The novel centers on the events leading up a Holy War, where the Shriah (The Pope) calls for a Holy War to be waged against a particular enemy. The book follows the storylines of multiple characters as they all conspire to take control of this Holy War for their own ends. Amid them all is a character introduced in the prologue, Anasûrimbor Kellhus, who has mysterious motives and possesses a terrifying power that few people understand. Overall, I thought this book was amazing. I will be jumping right into the next book and then the third after that. We'll see how I feel when I've finished the trilogy; I might continue into the following tetralogy. Link to my video review: https://youtu.be/SGjp3nBu6wI No Spoilers Overall As I mentioned above, this book centers on th

Red Country: Book Review

I just finished reading Red Country by Joe Abercrombie. This is the ninth novel of Abercrombie's that I have read, leaving only the Sharp Ends collection remaining. And I'm not motivated to go to that one, so we'll see when that happens. This book is inspired by Westerns. The premise is quite simple: Shy South returns home to find that her younger siblings have been kidnapped, their caretaken killed. So, she sets out with her cowardly stepfather to track down the man responsible. The largest appeal here is the character cameos, which I cannot mention without spoilers. This book is definitely my least favorite of the nine that I have read. I found the characters to be less interesting except for a few, and the plot and setting did not compensate to my liking. Additionally, my reading experience was rather split. I was rather detached from everything in the beginning, but I actually grew to like everything as the story continued. Despite the low ratings for Abercrombie, I sti