Review: Uniquely Epic Tale
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 02 15, 2013
I was highly impressed by The Black God's War.  It's the tale of two nations in conflict for generations, not just in a physical war of soldiers and armies,but of divine powers of the gods versus the more reasoned personal powers of sages.  Such a visceral conflict practically guarantees a considerable amount of tragedy and thought provoking interactions. The inclusion of deities that are truly active in the story events was an intriguing departure from the more common treatment in fantasy writing.  I appreciated the way the Rezzians' faith in their gods was presented as both entirely reasonable and absolutely necessary.The writing style is spare and concise, painting its visions with a minimal amount of prose. Major characters grow and change from very sketchy beginnings. The storyline does not follow expected paths, so that the reader is often surprised by events. The reader gets the impression of being part of a great war while following only the handful of main characters. Unlike many first novels, this story has no technical problems with spelling or grammar. There is still room for the author's style to mature and blossom, spicing up his very clean prose to become more vivid and exciting.I generally prefer more light-hearted fantasies, and found this one to be a bit too dark for my taste. I enjoy those happy endings that are so very commonplace in fantasy literature.  However, I find myself thinking about the various events within Black God's War and its very different magic systems, so that I feel that reading the book was very much worth my time. I will look forward to further books by this author.