A richly satisfying third series entry with grand actions and emotions.
Norse deity Odin hunts for his two rebellious children in this third volume of Chamberlin’s fantasy series.
In their vibrant youth, Brynhild and Thora had been Valkyries, the warrior daughters of Odin, the All-Father of Norse myth. When they decided to leave his service to start families, the deity cursed them. Odin’s interference caused Thora’s grown children to kill Brynhild’s Christian husband, Siegfried. Now, in the valley beneath the Harz Mountains in Germania, the women join in the Northern people’s Midsummer celebration. Although the women are now elderly “crones,” Odin resents their perseverance, and he’s losing influence in the world as Christianity gains followers. With the help of ravens to spy for him, Odin, taking the form of an old beggar, tracks down his former Valkyries. Brynhild and Thora, meanwhile, plan to travel north to Dane-mark to rescue Yrsa, Thora’s daughter, from the captivity of her sexually abusive father, Helgi Halfdansson. (Readers unfamiliar with the ancient literature that serves as this story’s model may be shocked at how rape, by deities and others, is depicted as commonplace.) Odin’s pursuit grows more complex with the involvement of Attila the Hun and his warriors. In a world of dark mysticism and strange beings, Brynhild and Thora will need to summon their remaining Valkyrie strength to outmaneuver wrathful Odin. Chamberlin’s brooding, philosophical third series entry makes for a fine counterweight to the more garish use of Norse deities, including Odin, in Marvel comics and films. Many details will fascinate history buffs, such as that the Christian “sign of protection” had been a call to the “power of Thor’s hammer” until the new religion absorbed the gesture. Throughout, the prose offers lyrical moments, as when the “elongated hills of Dane-mark” are described as looking as if “some giant with a leaky sand bag” had created them. The characters also make intriguingly complex observations; for instance, Brynhild believes that “the death of a child” isn’t “half the sorrow” that “having to raise one in a brutal setting must be.”
A richly satisfying third series entry with grand actions and emotions.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-954744-52-3
Page Count: 366
Publisher: Epigraph Books
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
A freewheeling, action-packed fantasy with a dash of romance.
Kova offers a fantasy novel set beyond the Nightgale Mountains in the walled fortress of Vinguard where citizens live in fear of the next deadly dragon attack.
Vinguard’s residents are always on guard against the threat of dragons, but they must watch more than just the skies. Living among them, hiding in plain sight, are the “dragon cursed”—people who, at any moment, may transform into terrifying winged beasts and destroy the city from within. For most of Isola Thaz’s life, she’s been told she’s the reincarnated savior of Vinguard. But just as she begins to suspect that she may be dragon cursed, she’s tossed into Vinguard’s Tribunal—a contest in which every 18-year-old competes in tests of skill and might to separate loyal citizens from the dragon cursed. As she’s sequestered for this rite of passage, Isola hesitantly allies herself with a handsome fellow competitor named Lucan. However, as the teens face such trials as fire-breathing automatons (“The silver beast comes to life with a swing. Its claws shear through the dim light”), starvation, and actual dragons while unarmed, Isola begins to feel that Vinguard’s traditions come at a cost that’s too steep. Meanwhile, Vicar Darius, Lucan’s father and the leader of Vinguard’s shadowy theocracy, the Creed, is desperate to take Isola’s powers for himself—and, to that end, he puts her into increasingly tortuous situations. However, neither he, nor Isola’s teenage rivals, are very compelling antagonists; instead, they come across as caricatures of cruelty. Still, the novel is fast-paced and action-oriented with a punchy prose that prioritizes movement over fantasy aesthetics. A sometimes-fraught romance between Isola and Lucan slowly blooms, but Isola’s relationship with her family forms the true emotional core of the narrative. Although the worldbuilding in fairly simple, the story sets up a massive mystery that promises big payoffs in a potential future installment.
A freewheeling, action-packed fantasy with a dash of romance.Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2026
ISBN: 9781649377838
Page Count: 448
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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