This absorbing, magical tale boasts a superb cast of spirited characters.
Ambitious recruits of a peacekeeping association brave a war-torn world using magic and ingenuity in Fitzgerald’s debut fantasy.
The Perpetual War has ravaged Archengard for so long that no one even remembers why the fighting began. The conflict pits the Government against the Noda, a group led by the nefarious Jackals. It’s within this troubled climate that four individuals join the Navigational Brotherhood: mercenary Murta Kaster; bona fide knight Jezna Caelius; swashbuckler (read: pirate) Enoch Amon; and skilled marksman Dante “Prince” Larocque. Most Navigators have mastered magical “Ignis” abilities, but these four are a mixed bag. Enoch barely understands his own magical ability, and Prince, like his former Navigator father, has no Ignis. Although the recruits are ready to train, the Brotherhood base isn’t exactly safe—there are intermittent attacks and suspicious figures roaming the grounds; the Jackals, who many believe wield Ignis, are surely behind some of what’s unfolding. Meanwhile, Murta and the others vow to unearth the Sacred Heart, a powerful Talisman hidden for millennia that they certainly don’t want the Jackals finding first. Fitzgerald’s top-notch worldbuilding is sublimely dense (Ignis is a gift to humans conferred by the revered Dragon Lords). The principal four-person cast is dynamic, as each member comes with their own baggage that surfaces as the narrative progresses. Readers eventually get a clearer idea as to what the Ignis-gifted can do; apparently, no two abilities are alike. Jezna stands out just a touch more than her fellow recruits, due to her determination to uphold chivalry and the reason she consistently dons her “silver god armor.” While the character development and backstories unfold at a relatively slow pace, vibrant action scenes showcase the recruits’ varied skills, including Enoch’s “devastating right cross” and “burning knuckles.” The final act satisfies on multiple levels and leaves room for the story to continue as a series.
This absorbing, magical tale boasts a superb cast of spirited characters.Pub Date: today
ISBN: 9798347007738
Page Count: 420
Publisher: Podium Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 31, 2025
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
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
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