The Queen of Crows by Myke Cole
Myke Cole happens to be one of my favourite authors, his stories a great mix of well etched strong characters and fast paced narratives punctuated by explosive action sequences that propel the story onwards. Sacred Throne, part - I The Armored Saint that gave us Heloise Factor, the plucky young girl forced to don up a machine-powered armour suit and protect her family and friends against a tyrannical religious order, was one hell of an introduction to the series. I had loved that book!
The Queen of Crows is book-II in this series and picks up right where we left Heloise and her rag-tag bunch of mutineers, who have won the skirmish and lived to see another day - Heloise herself now bears the tag of the Emperor's 'Palantine' one of the chosen ones, who has killed a devil and lived to tell the tale. There is no break in proceedings as Myke pitches the reader headlong into one frenzied skirmish after the other, frequent back to back violent confrontations with the enraged Pilgrims led by Brother Torn and his band of religious zealots, culminating in a long, protracted bloody siege at the climax of this book.
This book is thicker than the first one in the series, coming in a shade over two hundred fifty pages and is much darker and bleaker in tone, compared to the first book. Heloise has now seen enough bloodshed and violence to have hardened her overall resolve. The machine-powered outfit becomes her albatross to carry through this bloody war. An instrument of war, yes but also pitching her unto the hitherto unasked responsibilities of a leader, a leader of a set of lost people, victims of war looking and yearning for safely out there in the dusty plains of this brutal world.
Myke channelizes the brutality and the lawlessness of this world really well in the depictions of the frequent violence that leaps off the pages. The action is well detailed and plays well enough to leapfrog the narrative from one twist into the next. Heloise and her family - including Samson, the ex-soldier, Barnyard the huge tinkerer who is now in awe of Heloise and bows down to her, treating her reverentially as "Your Eminence", Sigir the Mayor and a bunch of new friends they make on the road - the Kipti or the Travelling gypsies with their talent for magic used in healing and then some. Heloise has experienced tremendous losses and her plight in this book is no different either. The relentless hardships continue to plague her - not just in the form of the attacks and battles with the religious order but her own beliefs and set of principles laid down in her childhood, challenged and torn apart. She makes new friends, even gets attracted to some, introspects a lot but finally hardens into a capable leader of men, tasked with tough decisions and ultimately, survival.
There are few older faces here, but I felt Samson who was possibly one of my favourite characters from the first book, was left to be fairly uni-dimensional. Being an over-protective father fearing for his daughter's life in this cruel world. Newcomers including the Kipti Mothers and others like the knife-wielding Onas and his sister Xylika sparkle in brief bits but ultimately, this book becomes the vehicle of transformation for Heloise. Her arc of self-discovery and change is well plotted but along with this, the world building also grows beyond the borders of the village of Lutet. Smartly folding in the countless folklores and also war accounts about the fabled Emperor and also his legion who once defeated the demons.
While I enjoyed the fare thoroughly, I was a bit underwhelmed by the ending of Book-2. Logical as it was, a natural end point for Heloise's life-journey, there was nothing in the book that couldn't stop my attention from straying. I fully intend to wrap up Sacred Throne by reading the Killing the Light to understand where Heloise is going to go from here. A worthy follow-up to the tales of the Sacred Throne, a well-paced, gut-punchy and violent sequel that furthers an engaging tale of revolution and freedom.
The Queen of Crows is book-II in this series and picks up right where we left Heloise and her rag-tag bunch of mutineers, who have won the skirmish and lived to see another day - Heloise herself now bears the tag of the Emperor's 'Palantine' one of the chosen ones, who has killed a devil and lived to tell the tale. There is no break in proceedings as Myke pitches the reader headlong into one frenzied skirmish after the other, frequent back to back violent confrontations with the enraged Pilgrims led by Brother Torn and his band of religious zealots, culminating in a long, protracted bloody siege at the climax of this book.
This book is thicker than the first one in the series, coming in a shade over two hundred fifty pages and is much darker and bleaker in tone, compared to the first book. Heloise has now seen enough bloodshed and violence to have hardened her overall resolve. The machine-powered outfit becomes her albatross to carry through this bloody war. An instrument of war, yes but also pitching her unto the hitherto unasked responsibilities of a leader, a leader of a set of lost people, victims of war looking and yearning for safely out there in the dusty plains of this brutal world.
Myke channelizes the brutality and the lawlessness of this world really well in the depictions of the frequent violence that leaps off the pages. The action is well detailed and plays well enough to leapfrog the narrative from one twist into the next. Heloise and her family - including Samson, the ex-soldier, Barnyard the huge tinkerer who is now in awe of Heloise and bows down to her, treating her reverentially as "Your Eminence", Sigir the Mayor and a bunch of new friends they make on the road - the Kipti or the Travelling gypsies with their talent for magic used in healing and then some. Heloise has experienced tremendous losses and her plight in this book is no different either. The relentless hardships continue to plague her - not just in the form of the attacks and battles with the religious order but her own beliefs and set of principles laid down in her childhood, challenged and torn apart. She makes new friends, even gets attracted to some, introspects a lot but finally hardens into a capable leader of men, tasked with tough decisions and ultimately, survival.
There are few older faces here, but I felt Samson who was possibly one of my favourite characters from the first book, was left to be fairly uni-dimensional. Being an over-protective father fearing for his daughter's life in this cruel world. Newcomers including the Kipti Mothers and others like the knife-wielding Onas and his sister Xylika sparkle in brief bits but ultimately, this book becomes the vehicle of transformation for Heloise. Her arc of self-discovery and change is well plotted but along with this, the world building also grows beyond the borders of the village of Lutet. Smartly folding in the countless folklores and also war accounts about the fabled Emperor and also his legion who once defeated the demons.
While I enjoyed the fare thoroughly, I was a bit underwhelmed by the ending of Book-2. Logical as it was, a natural end point for Heloise's life-journey, there was nothing in the book that couldn't stop my attention from straying. I fully intend to wrap up Sacred Throne by reading the Killing the Light to understand where Heloise is going to go from here. A worthy follow-up to the tales of the Sacred Throne, a well-paced, gut-punchy and violent sequel that furthers an engaging tale of revolution and freedom.
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