Review: The Faithless, by C.L. Clark

 

The rebels have won, and the empire is withdrawing from Qazal. But undoing the tangled web that binds the two nations won't be easy, and Touraine and Luca will face their greatest challenge yet. Luca needs to oust her uncle from the Balladairan throne once and for all and take her rightful place as Queen. But he won't let go of power so easily. When he calls for a "Trial of Competence" and Luca's allies start disappearing from her side, she will have to prove her might. And she knows someone who can help...
Touraine has found a home in the newly free country of Qazal. However, she soon realizes that leading a country and leading a revolution are two very different tasks. And, even more importantly, if Luca won't keep her promises, the Qazali could end up right back where they started. Together, the two women must overcome their enemies, their history, and their heartbreak in order to secure Luca's power and Touraine's freedom.

"You haven't been just a soldier in a very long time". C.L Clark's The Faithless is the perfect middle book of a trilogy, hardly suffering from second book syndrome. Where the focus was on Touraine in the first book, now it's Luca taking center stage, giving us a much needed insight into the inner workings of her mind and the lengths she's willing to go to in order to win her throne. The setting works in her favor, showing her in her element, in a palace full of intrigue as she counts her friends and allies.

She and Touraine dance around each other for a solid chunk of the book, making this a delicious slowburn; we know that the attraction and affection between them are there, but they're on almost opposite sides, Touraine tasked to make the alliance work at any cost, Luca bent on preserving propriety. The longing is excquisite, and each moment they pass in each other's company is torture. The climax takes advantage of the edge of politics and gives them a solution that works because it's inherently theirs: they can make it work, and they will.

At the center is the conflict between Luca's empire and its once-colony, the land Touraine hails from and was taken from in order to become a soldier for the empire, trained in an experiment to prove the suitability of the "savages". Clark doesn's shy away from the brutality of colonialism, taking detours to another character left behind while she reckons with what's left to do at home after the battle's won. Meanwhile, the magical subplot emerges while the characters struggle, either to understand and master it or to win it for their own nation.

The world is painted vividly, made much grander as Clark dives into the empire and those who would seek to change things from the inside. That conflict will certainly be a focal point of the final book, and I for one can't wait for the conclusion to this engaging story of colonialism, duty, and love.

The Faithless is a solid sequel that sets the stage for what's to come.

✨ 4 stars

Snippet: The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Practice, by Sienna Tristen

 

Freshly-risen from the underworld of his insecurities, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani is halfway through his journey to the fabled Pilgrim State. But the world this side of the Iphigene Sea is not an easy one: violence and subterfuge litter the way forward, and something meaner stalks the edges of Ronoah’s certainty, something that threatens to turn the very reason for his pilgrimage to dust.
To survive, he will have to be clever and kind in equal measure. To ask for help from the acrobats and queens-to-be and foreigners’ gods that cross his path. To confront that beguiling, bewildering companion he travels with, the one whose secrets are so vast and unforgivable. He will have to draw on every story he knows in order to make it to the Pilgrim State with his soft heart intact—and then make it home again.

"Speak of this to everyone". Sienna Tristen's The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Practice is a stunning conclusion to this rich duology filled with empathy and self-care. Ronoah's journey towards healing is not over after the first book; now he has to practice what he learnt. Meanwhile the author shows us with their stunning prose their world filled with joy and life, a wonderful tapestry of stories where everything is connected. Ronoah builds new, lovely connections with people, and his relationship with the god first known as Reilin only grows in complexity and tenderness, towards a miraculous ending.

✨ 4 stars

Review: A Day of Fallen Night, by Samantha Shannon

 

Tunuva Melim is a sister of the Priory. For fifty years, she has trained to slay wyrms – but none have appeared since the Nameless One, and the younger generation is starting to question the Priory's purpose. To the north, in the Queendom of Inys, Sabran the Ambitious has married the new King of Hróth, narrowly saving both realms from ruin. Their daughter, Glorian, trails in their shadow – exactly where she wants to be. The dragons of the East have slept for centuries. Dumai has spent her life in a Seiikinese mountain temple, trying to wake the gods from their long slumber. Now someone from her mother's past is coming to upend her fate.
When the Dreadmount erupts, bringing with it an age of terror and violence, these women must find the strength to protect humankind from a devastating threat.

"A queen should learn the ways of watching". Samantha Shannon's A Day of Fallen Night is the long-awaited new book in the Roots of Chaos series, set roughly 500 years before The Priory of the Orange Tree. It's a sweeping epic, larger in scope than its predecessor, much more compelling and richer; but it wouldn't have been so without the first one to pave the way, to set the stage. To an extent we already know the world, and thus Shannon wastes no time introducing us to it, merely painting with deft strokes this older iteration of what we already know, and giving us enough to get our bearings.

It's a prequel, then, but not quite; the story is contained, giving us a sense of the endless cycles that balance the world. We learn a bit more of the mechanisms in place, while following along with the stories of new, intriguing characters. The four protagonists have each of them compelling stories that slowly come together, revealing new depths and interesting connections. The Priory gets explored more, the monarchy of Inys gets explored more - and its terrible price thoroughly explored! - the East is better developed than in the first novel, and we learn more about the northern region. Slowly, Shannon is widening the scope of the world, enriching it. A perfect touch is the changes in spelling from what we already know, showing that language changes over time.

The crown jewel of this novel are the relationships between the characters: filial, maternal, platonic or romantic; friendships that overcome everything. There's betrayal, and grief, but also triumph and joy in the face of adversity. There's a beautiful, sweet wlw romance between older characters that is a balm for the soul, and another with younger characters that develops slowly, naturally. There are raw moments of unrequited love that tear at one's heart, and there's even a sweet brief inkling of a mlm romance. Every character has their role to play, be they small or big. Every moment has importance, even those quiet moments of grief.

The only downside is that, this being a prequel, we know or suspect how many subplots might resolve. But Shannon plays with that expectation, constructing a novel that works even despite that small downside. There's also a part, towards the final quarter, that felt a bit rushed to me; but despite that, it's still a solid fantasy novel, an incredible epic with many things to say about motherhood and love and religion, and the choices we make.

A Day of Fallen Night is even better than the first book.

✨ 4.5 stars

Review: The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory, by Sienna Tristen

 

Ashamed of his past and overwhelmed by his future, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani feels too small for his own name. After a graceless exit from his homeland in the Acharrioni desert, his anxiety has sabotaged every attempt at redemption. Asides from a fiery devotion to his godling, the one piece of home he brought with him, he has nothing.
That is, until he meets Reilin. Beguiling, bewildering Reilin, who whisks Ronoah up into a cross-continental pilgrimage to the most sacred place on the planet. The people they encounter on the way—children of the sea, a priestess and her band of storytellers, the lonely ghosts of monsters—are grim and whimsical in equal measure. Each has their part to play in rewriting Ronoah’s personal narrative.

Change requires work. Sienna Tristen's The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory is like a long hug, a thorough exploration of living life with a crippling anxiety disorder, and of the steps to take in order to get better. Disguised as a fantasy travelogue, this books takes its time delving into Ronoah's psyche and his struggles, picturing them with a language that is both compassionate and precise. The reader gets to truly experience the terrible vertigo of his self-destructive thoughts, but also his journey towards healing. The writing is phenomenal in this regard, pulling at heartstrings all the way.

Deciding to follow Reilin in his journey is only the first step for Ronoah, who begins experiencing new things and learning that he too has value, sometimes yanked in that direction by his travelling companion. Reilin might seem callous at first glance, but he's supportive in his own pushy way, helping Ronoah begin his journey towards healing. Along the way, Ronoah will meet different people and experience important lessons, and he'll learn to share a part of himself - slowly, painstakingly slowly, he'll put in the work.

The world is painted vividly, so rich with a staggering history and complex in its own right. Interwoven in the text are snippets of tales, perhaps true, tales of the gods who made this world, tales recounted by the characters. It is a book about the importance of stories, about how context and a change in perspective can change how a story is read. The middle part, taking place in a caravan of traveling storytellers, is delightful, and it shows well the variety of this world. But stories permeate the text, both in the beginning and at the end; stories upon stories.

A glance at the plot might make one think that this novel is going to feature a queer love story, but in this first book of the duology it hasn't been the case; one detects a certain attraction, certainly admiration, towards Reilin, but this doesn't seem to be that kind of story. This is not a flaw: the book works perfectly on its own, painting Ronoah's important journey with all the care it deserves. It's still, to an extent, a queer book, and thus I feel like it should have a place on this blog: Ronoah comes from a country where queer relationships aren't frowned upon, and he's surprised to learn that this is not the case in other countries, that he's travelling through a country where queer love is punished. There's a beautiful conversation with a queer minor character who discovers, through a story, that he's not alone, that queer people do exist other than him; and a character seems to be nonbinary, to the extent that a word like that can mean something to an all-powerful being.

The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory is a precious journey to experience.

✨ 4.5 stars