What is SPFBO 9?  This is  a competition where authors of self-published fantasy can enter their work. The objective to find a winner out of the 300 entries submitted.  Ten judges (or judging teams) each receive 30 entrants.  Each judge/team will eventually submit one finalist to the second round where a winner will eventually be decided upon. Check out Mark Lawrence’s post here to look at this year’s entrants, judges and allocations list.

My introduction post can be found here and also the Critiquing Chemist recently posted their first elimination post.  I posted my first ‘cuts’ last week.   My second elimination post can be found here.

This week I will be aiming to post a review a day (7 in total) followed by an announcement of my Semi-Finalists.

These reviews are in no particular order and have been randomly selected.

My third review is for The Bone Spear by Alexander Layne

I was excited that The Bone Spear fell into my batch of books, even before I had the first notion of what to expect that beautiful cover really did wow me, and I will say, having read the book the content is equally impressive.

The opening chapters of this are captivating.  We meet Ettarian, a battleworn soldier, tortured by his past and his perceived failures.  Ettarian is helped by a seraph named Lasirah who has chosen him to help mankind.  She wants him to rally the survivors into fighting back and reclaiming their lost world.  We then meet Lasirah,  A girl of 16/17 who lives in a town called Halbrook.  Lasirah’s mother was killed by a Danir and she has since been raised by her abusive father who has a terrible temper which is often accompanied by flashing fists.  Lasirah runs away into the barren lands outside the town walls.  She doesn’t have a plan but in a ruined village she meets an Ashir (a child of the Flayed Gods) named Annexus and is taken under his wing.  Of course, Annexus has something in mind for Lasirah and is going to mentor her for this chosen path. These two characters are now set upon paths chosen for them, each believing the other is the enemy.

The world is a post apocalyptic ruin.  Food is difficult to come by and the water is spoiled.  Years ago (I think approx 25-ish) Monsters and Flayed Gods banded together and planned the destruction of humans and their world. Opening giant gates they swarmed through in massive numbers slaughtering and fighting with Gods until humans were on the brink of extinction.  The survivors crept away and hid, biding their time and over the years the Danir/Ashir slowly became less organised and fractured.

What I liked about this in particular.

Well, this is a dark story that doesn’t hold back the punches but the writing is really quite beautiful.  The execution is polished and the story is well planned and well executed.   Make no mistake, this is grimdark, there is horror and there is ick but it doesn’t feel overbearing or gratuitous.  This is a harsh world and the monsters that invaded are brutal in the extreme.

There isn’t a huge cast of characters and yet the story is epic.  Here we have two characters who are on a route to save mankind (or at least they both believe that to be the case).  They are both assisted, one by a seraph, one by a demon which adds this perfect sort of balance.

We do have another character included in the POVs, Davinius, who becomes Ettarian’s second in command.  Three POVs with two alternating storylines.

The timeframe here covers a number of years as the two primary characters go about trying to achieve change and the jumps in time were well handled.

The writing is good, particularly the action scenes and the pacing is also really good. I had no problem finishing this in two or three sittings and was always keen to return.

The characters are all well drawn. Ettarian suffers massively with guilt and similarly, Lasirah has her own personal demons to deal with from the past.

I will say that the ending surprised me. I didn’t see that coming at all.

In terms of criticisms. Not really a criticism as such, more for potential readers to be aware, this is dark.  The world is shocking in itself but there are also some fairly heavy themes around grief, the effects of war, PTSD which are well incorporated but also add that extra layer of ‘grimness’

I received a copy courtesy of the author for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.

Here’s my first review for Of Thieves and Shadows (The Heart of Quinaria #1) by BSH Garcia.

Here’s my second review for Dark Innocence by PJ Alexander