This dynamic world and cast of characters promise an engaging saga to follow.
A metalworker braves a war-ravaged land to reunite with her sickly father in Somerset’s fantasy novel.
Ever since her father left to live with her uncle, Cosette Argant has run Argant Fine Metalcrafts on her own. Business was excellent until her coastal city of Marenburg found itself at war six months ago. The island country of Tearn has invaded the Republic nations, starting with Marenburg, which is split into 11 walled sections, or Quarters. Staying afloat is challenging enough for Cosette, and nearly impossible once civil unrest spurs a mob that storms the shops owned by reputed Tearnan sympathizers. Around the same time, Cosette gets word from her uncle, who writes that her father isn’t doing well. She’s determined to see him, but since she’s in the Journeyman Quarter, she’ll have to traverse three Quarters to reach the one where he currently resides—and those are now all Tearnan-occupied lands. Cosette sets out on the dangerous expedition, only to be grabbed by Tearnan soldiers in Sootlund, the first Quarter outside of Journeyman. These “gray sheep” (as Maren citizens call Tearnan soldiers) initially suspect Cosette is a spy and detain her. But it’s not long before they see her merit as a bright, capable woman fluent in both the Tearnan and Maren tongues. Likewise, Cosette gradually realizes that not all of the enemy gray sheep are malicious. Intelligence Officer Desil, for one, a Sirka (a member of a race with mysterious origins), is unexpectedly empathetic and receptive.
Somerset loads this first installment of this series with exposition (Tearn’s motivations for invading the coastal city stem from the political aftermath of another invasion a mere two decades earlier, as well as an assassination). The backstory showcases the author’s stellar worldbuilding—the novel includes an entire continent of nations, though this story centers on Marenburg. Some of the exposition comes courtesy of footnotes, which help the narrative to avoid decelerating too often. Cosette is a remarkable protagonist who puts herself at risk just because someone she loves may not have long to live. She tends to play the observer, a person only beginning to witness the conflicts that others endure—she previously “thought of the war as some far away thing that would never reach her.” Desil takes the narrative reins for a few chapters and reveals a plan she’s quietly working on (something that Cosette may have already deduced); as the story progresses, mutual trust seems possible. Contrasts between Marenburg (as part of the Republic Alliance) and Tearn further enrich this tale: While slavery exists in Marenburg, Tearn has outlawed it, even in its occupied territories. Similarly, magic is “one of the most grievous offenses” in the coastal city and surrounding areas, making Cosette wary of Tearnan mages. At the novel’s end, there’s plenty left to explore, from other locations on the map to such enigmas as the Watchful Eye, a legendary assassin. This dynamic world and cast of characters promise an engaging saga to follow.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 9781969510021
Page Count: 514
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Jan. 2, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
BOOK TO SCREEN
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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