The Hanged Man by K.D. Edwards

If you follow me on Twitter, or if we’ve ever had a conversation that lasted slightly more than 2 minutes, you already know my feelings about The Last Sun, the first book of The Tarot Sequence. In short, it’s one of my favourite books – and I can’t begin to explain how excited I was about the sequel. Here’s my reaction when I received the eARC:

So…yeah. Very excited.

I don’t think I can do the book justice with my review. To say I enjoyed it would be the understatement of the year. It fulfilled every promise made by The Last Sun and set the entire series into an even more exciting direction.

The Hanged Man picked up pretty much from where The Last Sun left off, in a sort of soft cliffhanger: Max, the last scion of the now fallen Lovers court, was promised in marriage to the reclusive and dangerous Hanged Man. And the groom is coming to collect… But Max is now under Rune’s protection, and there’s no way in every conceivable hell he’s letting that happen. The problem is that the Hanged Man is Arcana, with mysterious and disturbing powers. Rune, even with the help of an ever-expanding entourage, can’t face him head-on. He needs the support of the other Arcana, and for his case to be rock-solid, he also needs more proof of the Hanged Man’s many crimes.

Making Friends and Influencing People has never been Rune’s (or Brand, his Companion’s) forte. They had an “us against the rest of the world” attitude for a long time, working on the fringe of a world that rejects them since the fall of the Sun court. They can’t afford isolationism anymore, simply because the “us” has started encompassing more people, who are vulnerable and depending on the Sun Court’s protection, such as it is.

The book is a moment of reckoning for Rune. He realises that the attack against his court was also an attack against his father’s retainers and people. That his fallen court is still his.

I was not a sightseer to this moment; I was its catalyst

It’s pretty much the quote that sums up Rune’s journey. He was in survival mode, now it’s time to thrive. And it’s extremely satisfying to follow. Every time Rune reminds everyone (himself included) that’s he’s a power to be reckoned with is goosebumps-inducing.

The aforementioned entourage is also shining bright in this book. Brand is still his hilarious loving and loveable asshole self. He has some killer one-liners, but also some very emotional moments with Rune. Their bromance is one of the many, many things this series does extremely well. The Hanged Man is the occasion to learn more about him, and also about the Companion bond in general.

And on the romance front…Addam. Imagine me saying his name with a happy sigh. The romantic subplot could have been so tricky to pull off. Rune is a sexual abuse survivor, which makes intimacy complicated. But we don’t have any of that “the love of a good man can heal any wound and any trauma” bullshit. Addam doesn’t push. He doesn’t cross boundaries, or guilt trip. He trusts and he loves and he cares, and in literally every scene they’re together, I’m a puddle of “awww”. They’re good together, and Addam respects the fact that Rune’s relationship with Brand is always going to come first. He’s also a remarkable father figure to his brother, Quinn. All in all, a cinnamon roll too precious for this world, etc, etc. I wish we could have had more scenes with him. I am greedy and spoiled – the first book was about his disappearance, so it focused more on him. Now the spotlight has moved, which makes sense. Still…More Addam in future books, I beg of you, KD.

The entire character ensemble has a wonderful dynamic. Quinn is still struggling with his powers, but he found in Max the perfect partner in crime for many, many shenanigans. Max is a complete sweetheart who is learning how to trust, and how to belong to a family that actually loves him. Lord Tower is still very mysterious and lord-tower-y. Ciaran is a wild card (yes pun intended) and manages to steal every scene he appears in.

We also have new characters introduced – and I was reminded of a quote from Rune in The Last Sun:

Matthias, this isn’t an eighties sitcom. I can’t casually accept an orphan into my house for comic relief.

We’re now pretty much well into a Full House remake…And it’s fantastic, how these people make a family that’s not so much found as it is chosen, and acknowledged as such, again and again. They provide solace in a dark world, where terrible shit happens.

Speaking about terrible shit happening…yup, the titular Hanged Man. You know that trend of villains who are actually more than meets the eyes, and maybe there’s good in them, some nuance, all that stuff? Yeah, that’s not what’s happening here. He’s a fucking monster. The fact that he wants to “collect” a teenager as a spouse, and the fact that it’s not the first time he’s done it, should tell you everything you need to know about the kind of antagonist we have here. But the thing is, the Hanged Man is more a symptom of something systemic. Rune’s assault and the Heart throne’s corruption are other indications that there’s something rotten in the state of New Atlantis.

We get to know more about Arcana magic – and in general, more about the exquisite worldbuilding. There are hints and winks that will probably develop into something more in the next books (for example, one does not simply mention an extinct dragon race in a fantasy book without said dragon race to turn out to be slightly less extinct than expected in later sequels). There’s so much to learn still, the world is so expansive and imaginative that it will never fail to feel fresh.

With this instalment, I started putting on my tinfoil hat and trying to figure out where things are going. The parallels between the relationship between Lord Tower and Rune, and the one between Rune and Max are making me slightly worried. After all, Rune participated to the raid against Max’s house. Does it mean that Lord Tower had something to do with the attack against the Sun court? Is it a coincidence that Lady Death first appears in this book, when Death in Tarot is a sign of change and transformation? I reread The Last Sun (look, I’m obsessed, this is what happens when I get obsessed) and there’s something Quinn said about time showing Rune his role. Quinn’s prophecies tend to be literal, and I feel like there’s something going on with the now fallen Hourglass throne…ok, I’m rambling. The tl;dr of this particular paragraph is that I’m now a Tarot Sequence conspiracy theorist, we meet on Tuesdays (or do we?).

The wonderful thing with this book, and really, the entire series so far, is that it hits you on every front. Characters, worldbuilding, plot: everything is masterfully crafted. I am ridiculously excited about what’s coming next.

Many, many thanks to KD Edwards and Pyr for the review copy! The Hanged Man is to be released on December 17th.