An engaging tale of prophecy and magic with solid characters and mythology.
In the beginnings of a war against a group of mysterious, magical beings, a young woman learns of her own connection to an ancient prophecy in Munger’s fantasy series-starter.
In the Kingdom of Lavonshia’s rural province of Dorak, 21-year-old Aurelia Talbot lives a quiet life with her father in a village called Chelam. It’s a peaceful place, unaffected by war or crime, but other parts of Lavonshia aren’t as lucky. Recently, the city of Saan was decimated, with the entire population disappearing. The accused perpetrators are members of a mysterious nearby group of clans called Gray Cloaks, who have magical abilities and maintain peaceful relations with Dorakians. A group of Gray Cloaks appear in Chelam and announce that the Ka—the king’s army—is headed their way, and that Aurelia’s in danger—and she must leave Chelam with the Gray Cloaks immediately. Aurelia departs with a Gray Cloak named Daphne, accompanied by best friend Eken and Col, the son of Chelam’s most prominent family, who wishes to marry Aurelia. Daphne reveals that Aurelia is at the center of a prophecy about a Storm Grazer: “one who rides the storm clouds and holds lightening in hand.” Meanwhile, the Ka are seeking the missing people of Saan, killing any Gray Cloaks they encounter. Ka soldier Magnus Alwyn is wracked with guilt after his unit massacres a Gray Cloak village, and he isn’t the only disillusioned soldier; later, Daphne saves him and his comrades from a pack of Shadow-Wolves. In this fantasy novel, Munger presents a tale of friendship, loyalty, and betrayal. The author’s love for the genre is palpable on every page; the compelling tale is populated with intriguing characters throughout, and the worldbuilding is convincing and sound. Readers are likely to enjoy the detailed and sometimes playful descriptions of the various players most of all; they include NoNo, a catlike creature who “possessed the peculiar ability to blend in with his surroundings, invisible to any who glanced his way. With a whisk of his tail, he became a stray bolt of cloth tumbling along the street, or a mischief of mice scurrying across a room.”
An engaging tale of prophecy and magic with solid characters and mythology.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781971248011
Page Count: 450
Publisher: True Mark Publishing
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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