Salutations, readers! October has disappeared, but is reportedly hanging on for dear life. I guess it’s that time of year when autumn leaves and winter approaches.
In other news, Gaea has been pushed back . . . predictably. The tentative date was Oct. 28, but I knew that was a long shot. So instead, December 10 2024. It will be available for pre-order shortly, though (within the next week). I’m currently writing a synopsis for new readers and an author’s note, as well as finalizing the new maps I’m including, and there are a couple of things to iron out before final revisions and proofreading.
And now for something new, which I should have started a long time ago . . . here’s my first official book review on the Idea Engine!
After hearing about the Faithful and the Fallen series for a while, I gave it a try. This was after picking up his latest series with The Shadow of the Gods, a Norse-inspired novel that, while impressive in many ways, annoyed me to death. But everyone said this series was great, so, as I have with countless other popular fantasy books, I said “All right, how bad can it be?” (With a grimace, knowing I’ll probably just put it down soon.)
It’s amazing. Epic, slow-burning, gritty and brutal at times but not just for the sake of it, and featuring many a grand battle against giants and monsters. Pure, epic medieval fantasy. The prose is functional but smooth, describing characters and battle scenes alike in vivid detail using few words. For all that I’ve heard it described as grimdark, it came off as almost relaxed. When things escalate, generally there is a solution and life goes on. Time passes, characters get built. It gets a lot more intense toward the end, though, with more than a few significant deaths and at least one incredibly shocking twist. John Gwynne has his own style of pacing that I quite enjoyed. Malice covers an impressive amount of ground without resorting to those cheap Hollywood twists that feel like checkboxes on a three-act structure checklist.
The initial and obvious conflict of the story is the threat of Nephilim-inspired giants who have a grudge against humanity, and tension over a looming battle between the creator Elyon and the dark god Azroth. It’s a good-versus-evil format we’ve seen many times, but with a more Biblical spin on it. There are plenty of cool parallels to the book of Genesis, which I won’t spoil, other than that the series title “The Faithful and the Fallen” does not refer to fallen soldiers. The theme centers around the moral corruption of man and the linked corruption of the world at large, and what happens when men try to force God’s hand. On that note, the main villain is remarkably well crafted.
It’s very clean for YA/adult fantasy, with no sexual nonsense and surprisingly little foul language. I was struck by the wholesome themes of family, bravery, authority, father-son relationships and what it means to be a man—all the stuff you don’t expect to see in books anymore. The female characters are no slouch either—in fact, the main character’s sister is one of my favorite characters. Corban is a boy who grows throughout his teenage years alongside his mother and father and sister. They’re all important to the story, and equally encourage, support and admonish him.
I could go on and on. It’s so good. I can’t wait to read it to my kids someday. It’s a gold mine for great discussion. Now, all this said, I still have three books to go and things are already taking some pretty crazy turns, so we’ll see how it goes. But Malice on its own . . . it’s hovering between 4.5 and 5 stars. I couldn’t recommend it more highly. The drawbacks were slight, including a few choppy scene breaks, repeated usage of recent flashbacks after starting mid-scene, and a couple instances of character frustration where Corban didn’t learn quite quickly enough. Nothing major. Some readers may struggle with some very archaic or colloquial language that is used without definition, so you might have to go by context or look up a few words. Like bairn.
Anyway, that’s all I have for now. Keep reading, writing, or whatever else you love to do!
— Jacob Gamber