I mostly enjoyed this book. Having read the Black Mage trilogy a few years back, I enjoyed stepping back into the world, and seeing how some of the details in that trilogy were originally instituted. The story was satisfactorily concluded.

That said, there was one area that greatly disappointed me. And here begin some significant spoilers! In the last third of the book, a minor character is revealed to be homosexual. Kachiro is handled in a compassionate way despite living in a culture that is very hostile to homosexuality. Though married to a more prominent female character, he has a younger male lover who the wife knows about and accepts. Then the story veers directly into the distasteful “bury your gays” trope when the young lover is murdered with absolutely no reason or perpetrator revealed. It’s tragic for no purpose and does nothing for the story. Worse, in his moment of ultimate grief, his loving wife chooses that moment to lead a group of women to safety from the war that had arrived in the city. And then he is not seen again. It left me feeling disturbingly cold after warming to the revelation that queer folk actually exist in this fantasy world. And it makes me hesitant to read later works by Ms. Canavan.