An often diverting fantasy tale, aided by impressive worldbuilding and a well-honed cast.
In Huston’s fantasy novel, a man and a woman, decades after their shared childhood trauma, reunite to mete out vengeance in a war-torn world.
Orphen McAvery made a promise to Cthali Worldbreaker when they were kids that he’d always be there when she needed him. Nearly 25 years later, Cthali gets a note to Orphen to meet him for coffee. They each have a thorny history: Golden-eyed Cthai is an exiled princess, and Orphen, as a teenager, belonged to a “gang” that investigated and tried to vanquish the cultish Church of the Seven Deep. The pair’s short time together during their childhoods included traumatic interactions with Amelia Westminster, a woman who abused them both and whom Cthali now wants to track down for purposes of revenge. The pair hop on a train and travel across the Crescent of Pangoi, a supercontinent on a planet that’s devoid of oceans. Complications quickly ensue during their travels; for example, Vandrissa Crone, the princess’ bodyguard, seems more interested in collecting the bounty that she claims is on Orphen’s head. Moreover, this small group, as they cross the nations of Pangoi, begin to see signs of war along the route, including burning and destroyed cities. In a world where magic is prevalent, Orphen and Cthali must wield their skills, such as invisibility and telepathy, to combat powerful foes, including Amelia. In addition, Orphen, Cthali, and Vandrissa end up in a love triangle of sorts, stirring up bad blood and a secret that Cthali has kept hidden from others.
Huston painstakingly develops the planet Endworld and its vast continent. For example, the distinctive nations include Titan, with its heavy military presence, and Oberon, with its desert lands, all in a bizarre milieu that features three prime energies across eight “accepted schools of magic.” The cast alone offers an array of visuals; various eye colors denote a person’s origins, and Vandrissa wears a mask, a gauntlet, and has “leathery, bat-like wings.” The process of how children are born in Pangoi is fascinating; only couples who’ve undergone a particular ritual can bear “true borne” children, while Cthali is one of the “star borne,” as she fell from the sky. The wealth of details that the author gradually reveals helps to illuminate a tale that opens with a bevy of people and places. There are several mysteries, as well, such as why the Church of the Seven Deep continues to thrive, and the significance of the “little ghost girl” who’s long appeared in Orphen’s hallucinations. However, other subplots, such as those involving romantic entanglements, aren’t quite as enthralling. Notwithstanding the ever-changing Pangoi locales, the present-day story doesn’t provide a great deal of narrative energy; instead, the characters tend to discuss and debate things that have already happened. That said, much of what does unfold in the present links unexpectedly to characters’ histories, which further enriches certain relationships. The story also doesn’t answer all the questions it asks, leaving room for a possible sequel.
An often diverting fantasy tale, aided by impressive worldbuilding and a well-honed cast.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 979-8988977100
Page Count: 483
Publisher: Endworld Archives
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
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
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