Tag: series

Book Review

Moon Reads: Revolve

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Revolve by Bal Khabra

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection. 

Surprise, this is the book I read first of the series but it is actually the third one which comes to show one of the strengths of this series, that each book is in itself a standalone despite making references to what has happened in the previous ones (since the partners are "new" to the team they won't have context so this is handled nicely o the reader gets context without feeling like overexposure). 

The reason I chose this book was because it wasn't just hockey but it had artistic skating. But why was that relevant? Because for part of my teenage years I start with artistic roller skating and then moved to inline hockey (as I couldn't find a partner and the coach also coached hockey). And of course because both where done on ice at official levels, I would try to skate loads in ice rinks when I could afford it. 

So I came at Revolve with cautious hopes, could it talk about two things I loved deeply and also give me a good romance?

The answer was yes. So much that I would end up really liking the whole series and going back to the other books. 

Revolve follows Sierra Romanova who had an accident during a competiton on the ice and that left her with panic attacks when she enters the rink, but she wants to reclaim what that accident took from her and prove that she can do it. But her previous partner has a new partner and no one seems to want to partner up with her, and it's too late in the season...

Enter stage (rink) left, Dylan Donovan, playboy hockey player and the bad boy from the team, who goads her back into skating and proving him wrong. And maybe he also has something to prove as he is kicked out of the team for his chaos. Hockey is his dream and he wanted to follow Aiden and Elias, so he needs to win his way back and maybe skating with Sierra will help this happen.  

Dylan seems to just love pushing Sierra's buttons but then he starts caring and at the same time, it is one thing to push her buttons and another to let her suffer a panic attack, for which he seems well versed in handling, whcih shocks Sierra. And as Sierra slowly tackles her panic attacks, her fear and starts becoming once again a star in skating, Dylan also has to face his own reasons for being so reckless and for acting out so much. 

I enjoyed both the hockey and the figure skating, and both Sierra's and Dylan's story was really sweet and chaotic (Dylan reminded me a bit of my current partner, he seems super chaotic and feisty but is very sweet and caring at his core, and Sierra was a bit like myself in some ways). 
This is also the hardest review to write becuase I read the book the longest ago so I remember less specifics and the ones I do are pretty much plot spoilers I'd like to avoid since they were important to the story, but I will say that Sierr'as previous partner gets his comeuppance given he was the reason she had her accident.
 
And their epilogue to me was actually the sweetest of them all. 

So I hope you get to love this series and enjoy it, while I go dive into Embrace and get a review ready probably in a few weeks.
Book Review

Moon Reads: Spiral

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Spiral by Bal Khabra

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection. 

We're now on the second book from the Off the Ice series.

In this one we follow Elias Westbrook (Aiden's best friend) just after Collide, when they've been drafted into the Toronto Thunders, but somehow he has become quite popular for his good looks and the perception that he is a ladies man, and yet he has not made his first career goal at all, just a lot of assists. And he honestly just desperately wants to escape the attention and focus on the game. 

On the other hand we have Sage Beaumont, a ballerina who has dreamt since she was a kid to be like Misty Copeland and therefore wants to perform in the Swan Lake. But it turns out that your social media popularity matters when it comes to being able to secure the lead role for it. 

So when the chance present itself, and they get photographed together with speculations that she's his new conquest and potentially a more serious one, they both react very differently. For Sage this is the chance to get that media attention she needs while helping deflect the speculation on Elias' love life. Whereas Elias remembers how bad it was for everyone who has been caught int he press and his won experience with it, so he doesn't want to pursue a fake relationship since he doesn't think the pressure is good on Sage. 

But he can't seem to get her out his mind, with her blunt tongue, her incessant teasing and her approach to life, he may be less into faking it and just trying his best to not fall head over heels for her. Whereas Sage is practical, she just aims for independence and that ballerina position and Elias is throwing some changes into her life that she doesn't know who to react and what to do about them. 

I liked this one a bit better because it's very obvious from the beginning that the fake dating is everything but fake, but it was also super interesting to see how the fact they call it fake takes some pressure off on some aspects of the relationship and then on others it causes a lot of worries of how they are "performing" that relationship.  For me that part and how it is written made me ponder a lot of what we tend to perceive as a good relationship whereas what may actually be one that is just not as flashy or good for social media.

This one felt way more homey and cuter than Collide. Where Collide is indeed a collision of personalities, Spiral is all about that spiral into love and both of them are spiralling fast and without any brakes on. 

It is not my favourite but damn it was so close to being top of the list from the series. And honestly, I finished it and the fourth book arrived so I cannot wait to continue with the series (perfect timing). I can't remember the last time I was into a romance series as much as I am loving Off the Ice. 

Elias is actually such a softie and he is so sweet, whereas Sage is a lot of spikes and attitude in part because she has had to be the responsible one and ot protect her life and her brother. IT was really lovely to see the softening the nicenes from Elias, and also to understand slowly why Elias is so soft and wants to protect others. 

So I guess the short one is that Spiral is soft fake dating that'll make you feel like a hug.
Book Review

Moon Reads: Collide

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Collide by Bal Khabra

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light. 

I have been fighting WordPress for a while since their silly paragraph block won't load or let me write, so I am using their "verse" one, so, sorry for the weird formatting if this shows weird. 

I will admit Collide was not my first read from the Off the Ice series, but rather I came to it after reading another one out fo order, woops.  But I wanted the reviews to be in the right order. 

Collide follows Summer Preston who is utterly dedicated to her lifelong dream of becoming a sports psychologist, so much that she chose a very hard professor to be the one that lets her submit her research and promotes her, because she believes what she is trying to work on is worth the eye of her professor. But she instead gets told that she has to do a specific paper and that causes her to have to work with Aiden Crawford.

Aiden is the captain of the hockey team, and he takes the hits for the chaos his team mates cause, which means he is the firing line and may not be able to play if he doesn't participate in Summer's research. 

Summer doesn't love hockey and has some issues with it due to things that have happened in her past that make her consider it a problem and not something she wants to be involved in so having to deal with a cheerful life is simple attitude Aiden drives her mad, whereas she has everything set to schedule and working like clockwork. 

But as they start working together on the research they start understanding each other a bit better, but they still don't want to admit that they may be a good fit. 

The read was quite fun and I liked that despite the college life view and the fact that sex is prominent, Aiden was courteous and Summer was fully fleshed, She wants to achieve her dream and she cannot understand why there are so many blockers. She has good faith and believes in merit, whereas Aiden understands merit is but one part and there's more to things. 

Admittedly, Summer had more plot pieces to show than Aiden but it just meant her complications threw some interesting challenges for him, not that she was trying to do so, but the way some of the  issues get resolved was also really good and at least one of them was something I was like "I wonder if" and it totally was, but I didn't feel frustrated that I was right, the romance was sweet and I already knew they'd end up together and what type fo relationship they have since I had read ahead (because the supporting characters for each story have their own story and show in the other books, so you get an almost continuous line of their life stories and the lense just focuses more on one specific set of characters). 

As the first book to introduce you to the world, I liked it quite a lot and still wanted to read more, and it does show you a lot of what is to come not just for Summer and Aiden but for the rest of the team. 

So I'd recommend this as one of those just Romance series and it is something very rare for me to do in regards to books as I don't readmuch Romance, but Bal Khabra has won me over for her series.
Book Review

Moons Reads: Seven Recipes for Revolution

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Seven Recipes for Revolution by Ryan Rose

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.

I am a year behind almost with this book, but I had this feeling that I had to be ready to read it. And I am glad I waited to do so.

For context, so that if you ask yourself why I loved it, I am a big fan of the manga Food Wars (and when I heard of this being pitched as Attack On Titan my mind also pitched it against Food Wars), most of my TV watching is things like Iron Chef, Culinary Class Wars, Chef and my Fridge, and any show similar to them (I am not big on the ones that ridicule too much the cook, it is all about the food for me). I also read a lot of manga and used to watch a lot of anime (a lot less now).

Now with that as a context and backdrop to my review, I have to say that this was a superb read. Paprick is a young man that has the job of being a butcher in a society that has a huge class divide and that also has magical beasts that when you cook specific recipes can give you powers. So he is part of the lower class who are almost indentured to the higher class (defined as “Rares”). And our story is about Paprick telling his backstory to an archivist (who he knew and was partly in his own story) while he is about to be condemned to death for his “crimes” and becoming “The Butcher” a figurehead for the Revolution.

This to me was an interesting mode of telling the story, because you are not getting the here and now story but what got Paprick to be called “The Butcher” and “Chef King”, and how he a common being somehow was able to make recipes that granted powers beyond the ones known already by the Rares.

And boy does Paprick take you on a wild ride. And I enjoyed this ride. It was super interesting to see him go from butchering to being able to create a recipe on the go because he wanted to have someone “do something”. He is a “hero” not because he particularly wanted to, but rather because circumstances put him in the place “someone has to do this” and when no one did it, he realised that the only someone that could try and that was going to try was him. This trait of him will already put off some people from this book, those who have so much privilege that they do not understand Paprick’s stand at all or how there is a need for someone, because people like this will always have other people to do whatever they need due to privilege.

Then there is the food, Paprick loves and lives for food. All he wants is to be a chef, to be allowed to learn and cook, and not to stay as a butcher. He butchers because that’s his assigned job and is better than other potential jobs, not because it is his choice. And the way the food and cooking is described here makes you hungry.

One other thing that may split people is that this book questions identity. It questions what makes a certain type of culinary experience more refined or “better” than other (why is a lobster bisque better than tacos con nopales by the fire?), and it asks some interesting questions about what the conqueror does and how they tell history and define the “right” way and the “cheap” and bad way of things, when neither is inherently better or worse. As I read about this conversation throughout the book I kept thinking on how a lot of the diet advise and nutrition is based on a Western view of the “perfect diet” and it only opts items from other cultures to make them into Superfoods.

Like avocados (or ube or matcha). Avocado toast being the rage when many Latin American cultures already ate a version of that for breakfast or lunch and where shunned for years for it, and suddenly it is now “healthy” but as I have learned myself, most of the Western view of avocados doesn’t know how to eat them or even prepare them properly, and what they consider refined is unripe avocados that barely have a taste and lack a lot of the richness and delight of a ripe avocado. And don’t get me started on the definitions of tacos, or how eating with your hands is dirty until you’re having a burger and then it is perfectly fine but other cultures using hands and food (like tortillas, naan, chapati, roti, etc) to eat is seen as unclean or “poor” or bad.

And you can see this conversation happening for Paprick as he is exposed to the world of Rares, and the culinary classes and how it asks some very interesting questions not just about food but the setup of society.

And yes, there is a revolution happening and brewing, and there’s a lot more on going in this book, but I think it is worth the reading of it and avoid the spoilers.

Overall, it was superb and I am looking forward to the second book coming soon as this was an absolute treat to read (do be mindful that this is very violent and graphic, so find the trigger warnings for it since you also need to come to it prepared for everything that will be in it). And if you can read it, I hope it is as delightful for you as it was for me.

Book Review

Moon Reads: Glam & Beardy Volume I

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The Very Serious Diary of Glam & Beardy Volume I by Ruby Clyde & Rachel WD. Illustrated by Vincent Batignole.

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.

I love good middle grade series. Some of my favourite have been Diary of an Accidental Witch, The Boy Who Grew Dragons or Tales of the Chocolate Heart. So when Little Tiger had this up for review and request, I had to try it to fill my middle grade craving for a good series.

Glam & Beardy do not disappoint at all.

We start by getting to know Glam who is the last child of the Glamour family and is hoping to get the most glamorous familiar, since all kids get one around her age, except her. Hers just doesn’t seem to come at all. We get to know her family and that the kingdom has several “families” with different skills, like glamour or wisdom or strength.

It is also not common but not a bad thing if your familiar is from a different family (like Glam’s mum, who was born into Wisdom but has a glam familiar). Glam gets sad that she can’t find a familiar, and she’s not very glamorous, until she does meet her familiar Beardy, who is definitely a not glamorous familiar, but even worse, they’re not a defined skills from the kingdom, so Glam is convinced she has the wrong familiar.

This leads to an adventure to try to find a way to find the right familiar for Glam and the right kid for Beardy.

One of the things I really liked was that Glam’s family isn’t absent, on the contrary they are there for her even if she doesn’t always believe it or actually feel like it. I love stories where the parents/family are supportive and part of the story and not just absent or there for plot points.

There was also a lot about friendship, belonging and about skills, and the nice thing is that Glam is very much interested in history and anthropology rather than glamour, but still tries to be as glamorous as she can.

It was super cute to read, the illustrations are spot on and really fun, and there’s a lot f the world and story yet to find out, so I am very curious for the next volume. If you enjoyed any of the series I mentioned above, this is a must read for sure!

Book Review

Moon Reads: Dungeon Runners Level 1: Hero Trial

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Dungeon Runners – Level 1: Hero Trial by Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.

I love middle grade fun series and Dungeon Runners starts with a bang for sure.

Kit is a small little gnorf (part gnome, part dwarf), which means he’s pretty small and doesn’t have any particularly great advantages for playing as Dungeon Runner, but he has always wanted to, since his own grandfather was one of the amazing teams back in the days.

So when a space opens up for a new team to join the Dungeon Runners, Kit is ready. Except that he has no team, so he finds new friends and a new team in Sandy, a sea witch who only knows one spell and Thorn, a vampire who loves knitting. Every team must have a healer, a fighter and a magic user, so they’re perfectly balanced to take it on.

The story is very cute and interesting, with Kit trying to be brave and fit as a fighter because it is one thing to dream you want to be part of a wonderful team, and then actually have to be an amazing team member is another thing. But what Kit may not have in strength he has in being a good gnorf, compassion and even courage when needed, and he will figure out the teamwork with Sandy and Thorn so that they can qualify to be the team selected.

I loved it, between the art, the “dungeons” the narrating of the actual “dungeon running”, and the three friends finding their strengths and weaknesses and the fun and clever ways. It is also a “fair” book in that they’re not perfectly winning all the time, it is an actual competition and therefore not everything goes their way just because they’re the main characters.

It’s a lovely little series and a good start for it, I am very intrigued where it intends to actually go, but so far (I have read up to book 3) it is very delightful and will be a recommended one for kids (one of my work colleagues’ kid is enjoying them too, so even kid approved for sure).

Book Review

Moon Reads: Shadow Baron

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Shadow Baron by Davinia Evans

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.

Now on to book two of this series. Now, this one took me much longer to finish, partly because I was reading other books alongside it and some of those were pretty epic and therefore I had to take a break from fantasy. But still enjoyed it.

This time I will start with the parts that were less positive. We are still suffering with pacing and world building issues. Though you can see that some of the plot is driving the need to fill in those gaps, but also some of those “fixes” are creating new areas and things that again, struggle with that fleshing out. And for me one of the biggest things was that we keep having a “mystery” for Siyon to fix, and that mystery is left too vague and then all of a sudden boom,the vague hints suddenly all align, but not in a satisfying way, they feel a bit clunky and sometimes a bit forced or just faceless, like they weren’t defined enough.

Out of this particular book’s plots, my favourite was Anahid’s. Look, she is going around betting with some semi unsavoury characters, visiting the Flower District (sex workers are called flowers here), and she’s somehow balancing her stifling social needs (barely) with her groiwng interest into the Flower Disctrict and the games she plays. The fact she ends up winning a Flower House out of one of the main gang bosses (who are some of the big baddies socially), and then ends up having somewhat of a feud with the gang since they feel offended of her not giving them the house back. Somehow they didn’t expect her to want to take her of the flowers and start changing things and their quality of life. I loved her taking on this challenge and using her social skills and all her training to be a perfect wife in high society, for making a flower house work more smoothly, even when she’s suddenly chit chats with some of the other gangs and their bosses and trying to defend herself and come out winning from the boss she won the house from (fairly).

Zagiri’s plot advances much more here, as she realises that the best way to make use of her privilege is to go into politics to try to change things inside the system. But as she finds a position that lets her start making small waves, she also starts accidentally being pulled into a rebellion that is brewing, because people remember her efforts before and how she used privilege to save lives. The story is still challenging her on how she intends to use her privilege but also the definition of what violence is and what paths are chosen for each side and why for some sides violence is not so bad but from the other, anything even close to it is considered bad. Lots of challenges for Zagiri, while also trying to maintain the facade of beign part fo the high society to keep using that privilege.

And finally Siyon, for me in this book his story was the most frustrating. He is missing Izmirlian, which fully understandable, and still trying to understand his new responsibilities, while trying to catch up on this new system and new rules of high society that he doesn’t know how to navigate and now has to figure out on the go. And then there is one of the gang bosses keeps appearing to him and doing cryptic messages (this “mystery” was the one I spoke about that is vague and tries to set itself up but doesn’t do it well enough). , plus the fact mythical creatures are suddenly appearing and people are upset about how the big magic changes in the planes are having cascade effects on their perfectly constructed life and can we please have a fixed world but no consequences thankyou very much. Which is very mcuh how sociery feels like, so this was done well. Siyon’s story here is about how to fit into a new world that demands of you to fix it when you don’t even know what’s broken.

AS we delve deepr into the specifics of each character’s arc, then we do get a slightly more fleshed out wrold for each of their pieces, but they feel a bit too disconnected form each other except when the characters interact or join them in their own way, but it isn’t enough still.

Oh and there is a naga, a djinn, and a dragon, so pretty cool story! Still worth reading and I will see what the last book brings. Hoping for some closure on many items.

Book Review

Moon Reads: Notorious Sorcerer

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Notorious Sorcerer by Davinia Evans

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.

I have no idea how I stumbled upon this book, but I was delighted when I finally picked it up to read.

This is the beginning of a trilogy and at the time I am writing this book, I have only read the first two books, and will probably pick the third one soon enough because I need to know how it ends.

Notirous sorcerer follows Siyon Velo, who dreams of becoming an Alchemist, a user of high magic, but instead just does errands and causes some fights and chaos to try to scrape enough money to actually have enough lessons of alchemy/magic. But he is more capable of magic than he knows, so he accidentally (because he has a good heart) manages to do something that is technically impossible alchemy wise, which plummets him into high society, and well, poor man has no idea what he is doing yet somehow everyone thinks he does or expects him to now be the one saving the day every time.

We also follow two sisters who end up heavily embroiled in Siyon’s world, Zagiri and Anahid. Anahid is a high society lady, in a loveless marriage to a very famous alchemist who is using her as a way to hide his love and relationship with a man (who has a lot of secrets). And what Anahid is trying her best to do is not ruin her reputation or the chances for her younger sister for when she decides to debut. Zagiri on her own side isn’t too keen to debut, she wants to be part fo the Dockside world, of the clans that patrol it and of the “fun”.

To me, the city of Bezim was a bit vague and was not fleshed out very well, the world building was sometimes a bit like it was floating just above ground but had no tether, so it made the first chapters hard to grasp and get into. So, why did I rate this so high?

Because damn, the characters carry this in a refreshing way.

Siyon is a mess, and he knows it, and is desperately trying to balance the fact he wants to achieve his dream and that he probably never will. Part of his plot puts him in a “what if you achieved your dream right now and it wasn’t exactly what you thought it’d be?”, he is inducted as an Alchemist, but then all hell keeps breaking loose and somehow the adultier adults keep looking to him to fix it. So he keeps finding ways to put a brave face on and try to make it work. He only really shows the reality to Zagiri and Anahid (partly, not fully) and Izmirlian, a curious high society man who wants to achieve his own dream and hopes Siyon might be the key to it.

Anahid starts off slow, trying so incredibly hard to align with the rules of her own class and the expectations of her circle, but making society think your relationship is perfectly fine when it is just a relationship in name is heavy on her shoulders, alongside her love and care for Zagiri and hoping that she can do better than she did. As we go through her story in the first book she starts to find ways to bend the rules or at least find some breathing room. Her question is more of “what do YOU want? how about being selfish for once?”.

And finally Zagiri, she represents a more spoiled high class kid who goes to play in the world of the lower classes, playing but always having a “way” out of some of the bad parts of the lower class challenges. And yet, she starts noticing that maybe neither world fits her. Her own path is less intense and less explored in this book, but is asks the question, “what if you saw your privilege? what would you do with it?”

I also really enjoyed the magic system and the planar worlds, it reminded me a little of the world building Sanderson does for Mistborn, and so, yes, it is a bit different than usual but was interesting and I ketp wanting to understand more as Siyon himself kept learning of it.

I do want to warn that the pacing suffers a little so you’ll breeze through some chapters then get lost in bad pacing and then come back to better pacing. I wish it had a little bit more editing and a little bit more effort on setting the world nicely so Bezim feels more alive and real.

Still, fi you enjoy swashbuckling, magic systems that are physical and planar, interesting various ages of main characters and two female ones, alongside some queerness, this may the series for you.

Book Review

Moon Reads: Paladin’s Grace

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Paladin’s Grace by T. Kingfisher

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.

I will start this review with two clarifications, this was not my first T. Kingfisher book (Nettle & Bone was and I enjoyed it very much), and that I did not read this on paperback but rather listened to the audiobook narrated by Joel Richards, who did an amazing job narrating the book.

The first thing we learn is that Stephen is a paladin, but of a dead god, one that died all of a sudden (and apparently the only one that has). And Paladin’s for different god’s do different things, and Stephen’s Saint of Steel was all about fighting and giving his Paladin’s the gift of basically becoming berserkers that do their holy duty and then leave a trail of blood and death once the job is done. Normally their job is to defend and collaborate with others. But now that their god is dead, the few leftover paladin’s are left broken since the majority died when their god died, consumed by grief and the berserker gift.

Stephen’s doing his best to cope by helping the Temple of the Rat (another god who doesn’t have paladins but that welcomed them and makes use of them to help everyone), and it is while finishing one of his duties for them that he finds Grace in an alley and they witness an assassination attempt go wrong. And somehow, the chance encounter becomes a repeated meeting due to circumstances.

Now they need to navigate a web of politics, treachery and a killer who seems to love separating bodies from their heads.

The novel is delightful, Grace is a perfumer trying to make a life for herself, and Stephen is a sweet man trying to do his duty and be kind, and he’s slowly falling in love with her while they try to investigate the assassination and the murders that keep happening in the city.

I don’t even know how to describe the story, but I loved all the bits, including Stephen knitting socks to pass the time, and the introspective of trying to find a purpose after his god died (how do you live and make a life when your purpose died suddenly. It is a lovely romance but it is also a murder mystery and there’s politics and intrigue, everything to make a good book.

Book Review

Moon Reads – Blood of the Old Kings

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Blood of the Old Kings by Sung-Il Kim. Translated by Anton Hur

Rating: MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px MoonKestrel Logo2 20px Grey

Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.

When I first requested this book I wasn’t sure how much I would like it since I am picky with my translated fiction (the translator can make or break a book, trust me on this). But I shouldn’t have worried, this book sunk its teeth into me and didn’t let go, and though for some reason I didn’t review it at the time that I read it, it’s one of those that lives rent free in my head.

We follow Loran, a swordswoman who is desperate to avenge her family after it was killed by the Empire, so she does what anyone would do and climbs into a volcano to find an ancient dragon from legend and try to negotiate with it so she can get her revenge. She gets an interesting deal on this and comes out with a fancy shiny sword and a greater purpose to her life. But having this purpose still doesn’t solve everything and so Loran keeps trying to make her way towards making a difference and in turn finds a lot of interesting adventures and situations that kept me rooting for her and also engrossed into her side of the story.

The other side is from “inside” the Empire, given that Loran more or less is an outsider to the Empire. Arienne in contrast has magic and is pretty much resigned to having a life where she will become the battery of the Empire upon her death. She lives a relatively good life but she still has dreams and ponder son them. So when she starts hearing a voice inside her head from a powerful necromancer, she starts questioning things, particularly if she is truly meant to just be a battery and what living a life means.

You get a nice contrast between both of the points of view, first in the environment (inside and outside of the Empire), but also in personality and approaches. Loran can use strength more than brain (not that she doesn’t use her brain), whereas Arienne has to use her brain first before her strength. And yet, both of them have to learn how to wield their own power and what a life lived means, and what that implies for the Empire, because if they use what they have, they are enemies of the Empire and all they can truly do is find a way to make having a future a reality.

I enjoyed this so much, it was so interesting seeing both of them slowly become heroines and also work through their own preconceptions and ideals, try to fight not just the Empire but their own internal battles.

If you like epic fantasy with high stakes, magic, swordswomen, dragons, and necromancy, this is the book for you.