This is an incredible debut full of intriguing worldbuilding and protagonists who are very different from one another. One of the dangers of this type of story is that often I’ll connect more to one character or not at all to another, or one of the storylines will drag. That didn’t happen at all for me here. I did have some trouble keeping track of all the political machinations going on, especially as I tried to translate that to what it would look like from Nasha’s point of view, but I understood things reasonably well I think. The religious layer worked really well for me—it’s not just a disguised Christianity even though they talk of “the Seraph”. It felt fleshed out and new and interesting, and it meshed in with the politics well I thought.

Adrian is super sympathetic as he tries desperately to be worthy in his father’s eyes like his older brother was, even as he arranges deals his father would never approve of in a bid to save his wife. His journey is heart-wrenching and I couldn’t wait for his plot line to tie in with the others.

Nasha is a hard character, a hunter who keeps away from others in her community partly because she’s worried they’ll look down on her for her slum-like background and partly because she’s hiding magic from them— magic that would get her killed if they found out. Her journey is incredible and awe-inspiring.

Then there’s Lynn, who’s trying desperately to save as many good people as she can find in a prison filled with corruption. But her actions are constrained in large part by the risk of her past coming back to haunt her if her old companions find out she’s still alive. The evil that nearly killed her rises again, though, and her hand is forced, pushing her to confront her past and oh my goodness, what a past it is! I loved Lynn’s storyline.

The world is a fairly typical medieval-fantasy-type world, with griffons and griffon riders. The magic is a softer magic system but there are definitely rules there, and it was super cool to see it from multiple sides. And the evil that Adrian and Lynn run up against was compelling and definitely kept me engaged. There’s huge battles, risk, sacrifice, loss, betrayal, all the wonderful epic fantasy stuff. Nasha’s line is more separate from the other two but it was still very cool trying to see how it and the other two plot lines impacted each other.

In short, it’s a remarkable epic fantasy that I fully expect to take off. I highly recommend it!