An entertaining read is an entertaining read--especially since so much fantasy these days is just outright garbage. It is the closest epic fantasy that comes close to keeping your interest as tolkien does.

It elevates the soul instead of making you feel like total filth. That is why i must let my eyes rest and regroup.

Most of the intrigue takes place in amorr (rome) the book is told in multiple in the republic of amorr we have stratgister militum corvus, his son marcus clericus, his rival severus patronus, and his daughter severa. Severa is the juvenile daughter of...  Read More

Based on the first two books if he ever finishes the series, i suspect the series will rank in the all-time top 5. Thankfully, it's the first in a series, so there are more books to come - i already have the second one and can't wait. The bar is set h...  Read More

Beale borrows heavily from latin for titles and names, so one culture seems to be roman. There's still chattel slavery, as an at least nominally devout man sells a disobedient * to a *.

The characters are either uninteresting or intensely unlikable. The plot is a poorly paced slog. The ending makes the novel as a whole feel like a massively overlong prologue.

The prose is wooden, and when it's not, it's obvious the author is trying too hard to mimic other more successful writers. Richie richie is insane if he can compare this is to any quality work, tolkien or martin.

The amount of filtering used is too much, and looked is exceptionally overused. It fails at any/all. The pastiche fails. The redundant do.

This is not to suggest that this is inherently a bad thing! It's because those are the only good things. Do yourself a favor and think twice before you try to gag down this piece of garbage. It is not often that i write negative reviews, but i felt i ...  Read More