A fantastic start to a fresh new epic fantasy

What a fantastic start to a fresh new epic fantasy tale.

So let’s start with this. The blurb says Rage of Dragons is Game of Thrones meets Gladiator. Well it’s very like Gladiator in many ways, but to say it’s anything like Game of Thrones is doing a disservice to both parties. This book is nothing like GoT. Nothing.

I think this is my first African-inspired epic fantasy book. I certainly can’t remember reading another one. It has a distinct flavour to it from the beginning through to the end, and it really helps to focus the immersion. In a market still largely populated by euro-centric settings, this made the book very fresh to me and I loved it. It felt new, different, and unique.

The narrator, Prentice Onayemi, was fantastic. He really helped bring the characters to life and put a lot of heart into the performance. A narrator can make or break a book when it comes to audio and Prentice certainly helped make this one. It’s fair to say I’ll be continuing the series in audio when future installments release.

So RoD is the story of a civilisation at war with its neighbours. The Omehi people are refuges/invaders and have been fighting against the native population for two hundred years. The war is unwinnable. They’re also a people who have built their society around not only war, but a rigid caste system designed to benefit those of strong blood (basically people who are taller and stronger in this case). Oh, and 1 in every 1000 (I think) women are born gifted which gives them magical powers that can tear a person’s soul out of their body into the underworld, enrage a person to make them giant killing machines, or even call down dragons. Thrown into this world we follow Tau, a commoner with no gifts or special power, or any prospects other than being just another expendable soldier. But Tau has something no one else has… a singular purpose, a drive that makes him push himself beyond his abilities and beyond his station.

There’s a lot of fighting in this book. The world Winter has created revolves around war and we follow a young man training to be a warrior. The fighting is well done with a good balance between description and narrative flow. It works well.

We only really have the one character arc. Tau is our only Point of View (mostly) and he develops naturally. At times he is frustrating as the hells, but then you don’t want your character to be perfect. Still… I wanted to crawl inside the book and slap some sense into him once or twice.

There’s quite a few twists and turns throughout and though a couple are obvious, others are not so much. It also does a fantastic job of setting up the conflict and world for the next in the series. This one is epic fantasy and makes no apologies for it. I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes next.

I have a couple of gripes. There’s some single chapter point of view swaps that make no sense to me. The rest of the book is told through Tau’s perspective and swapping heads just twice was odd and jarring. There’s also a few turns of phrase that were so awkward they pulled me out of the story to scratch my head and in one case laugh… in the middle of a gruesome battle scene. Oh and a sexy-time shaving scene. Ok, that last one is a personal niggle because shaving scenes aren’t sexy, they’re weird and awkward.

I enjoyed the hell out of RoD and can’t wait to continue with the story. I’ve no idea when book 2 will be coming out, but I’ll be picking it up as soon as it does.

I’m going with 4.5 stars for this one so I can round it up to 5. 😀

8 people found this helpful

A slow burner

I do like my fantasy books but am normally fairly vanilla with them in that I like the basic premises people associate with them.
I bought this on the basis of others reviews and am really pleased I did. It's a slow burner and can take a while to understand some of the words used to describe classes and people, however it is well worth sticking with.
The fallible hero and other characters are very well done and you care about their individual personalities.
The set up for the next book is excellent and I am already chomping at the bit for it.

As far as the person reading this, they are just....just..excellent. they have a soft voice that draws you in and help bring each of the different people to life.

Well worth listening to and sticking with.

2 people found this helpful

Great

Loved listening to this book. The narrator had the perfect voice for this story which was gory, sexy and addictive.

1 person found this helpful

4/5. Very cool Mr. Winter

It was a very fun listen and a fantastic first novel by author Evan Winter. I felt that the book tried to do too much in the space it had, and as a result the character work was weaker than I had hoped. Without spoiling anything, much of the development for the protagonist feels forced and, especially at the end, inconsistent. The setting however makes up for it, both for the place and magic systems built up. It's wonderfully original and feels extremely dynamic, helping keep the pace, meaning I finished the book very very quickly.

The audiobook however I felt was let down by the narration. I feel that the big emotional scenes of the book were poorly serviced by the narrator's emotional expressiveness (or lack thereof).

Overall 4/5. An original setting carries the story hard, but it isn't like the characters are unlikable either. I'm looking forward to what Mr. Winter puts out next- I'll be very sad if things don't get better with a start this strong given the author's potential.

1 person found this helpful

Fantastic, rich, unforgettable

I finished this 5 weeks ago and intended to review it then. It still leaves an impression now. Why oh why isn't the next one ready?

Tau (I may have misspelled it) is brilliantly drawn. If you like to see a character grow and change because of what is happened, because of his choices, and because of the situations he is propelled through, then this swordsman will grab you.

He grinds through hell and blood to gain any scrap of skill he grows into, and you feel his hurt, his experience, everything.

The start is a slow burn, it will take you a little time to feel why the first chapter is at it is but give that rich warm narration the patience it deserves and you'll be rewarded.

This isn't a shallow piece of brain candy, it's an involving detailed brain feast.

The central characters are not dragons themselves, but the people and their fight. It doesn't have simple good and evil, but you will feel a sense of right and wrong, through every slash and blow.

Swordplay is a major part of Tau and of the story but don't let that fool you. If a well developed character battling his way through the problems of his world in a manner that is far from simple has any appeal, then read this.

I loved it.

1 person found this helpful

Brilliant

Wow, what a pleasant surprise and now I cannot get enough! Brilliant story that is somehow made even better by the voice performance.

A Gem (stick with it)

The first hour of the book falls victim to world builder's disease. You're bombarded with so much context, context divorced from character, that the jumble of unfamiliar names can tax your patience. Get past that early threshold, and you'll find a tightly focused story of obsession and adversity, with language crafted well enough to re-read many times over. Onayemi's performance is flawless as ever.

A book I found too good to put down

Amazing writing with twists and turns I didn't see coming. For me this book was close to perfection

Exceptional new fantasy

wonderfully narrated and bold storytelling. I have read/listened to it all and Winter deserves his place in the best of modern fantasy.

Bloody hell what a story!

This book had me from the first page, intense, incredible a triumph, you'll love it for shizzle