A creative but overstuffed conclusion to the series.
The Highgladeseries concludes in this third and final tale of factions battling across a vast fantasy land.
As Jennings’ newest installment opens, the fate of the Athrani people hangs in the balance of a dying warrior, the noble hero Miera. Having sealed off the Otherworld—or so she hopes and believes—she breathes her last, and we are dropped into the ruinous landscapes of the world she left behind. In the wasteland of Khulakorum, Seralith Edos—or “Sera,” as readers come to know her—is mourning the death of her father figure, Gen. Aldis Tennech. Our first encounter with her is more somber than when we meet Alysana, who quickly wins readers over with a bit of cloak-and-dagger action (literally) to fell a guard and release prisoners we can only assume are wrongly jailed. The very next chapter, we meet Duna (each chapter features a different character’s perspective), who can’t help but be memorable, given that she is recently ascendant to throne of Haidan Shar. Next comes Thornton and his Hammer (hmm…) of Worldforge, followed by Kethras and then Asha, each of them a sort of demi-god whose help—or interference—plays out with drastic consequences throughout the battles that pepper this series. Jennings’ prose is typical warrior-fantasy fare, “She had dealt with power-hungry madmen before, but admittedly, this was her first time dealing with a power-hungry madman who also happened to be a god.” The well-imagined plot unfolds with nonstop action: Families are torn asunder, characters once thought dead are reincarnated in shady deals, and the bonds of loyalty and notions of honor and nobility will be tested in battle. But this third installment simply has too many perspectives for readers to truly connect with any of them. Though much thought has been put into this storyline and the humans and gods who live it, the end result feels unfocused.
A creative but overstuffed conclusion to the series.Pub Date: July 9, 2024
ISBN: 9781954676756
Page Count: 590
Publisher: Indigo River Publishing
Review Posted Online: June 25, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
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