From Africa to Asgard, to an invisible island in the Pacific and the Bone Road of a forgotten world, Fi and Zeke must come to grips with not only their newfound abilities but also who they are – and accept what they are becoming: wielders of ancient and dangerous powers, warriors, and maybe even heroes. But the end of worlds is coming, and time is short.
Titans will clash. Gods will battle. Monsters will swarm.
Can Peter and the Deva possibly defeat their age-old enemy in the face of overwhelming odds against them? There’s only one way to find out.
CRY HAVOC, AND LET SLIP THE GODS OF WAR.
It’s always a slightly sad feeling when you finish a series you really enjoy. As enjoyable as the journey can be, having to accept that it’s actually over can be a little bittersweet.
The Paternus trilogy is an action-packed, mythological blockbuster of a series. It’s like if all the religious/mythological pantheons throughout the world and throughout history came together for an Avengers-esque movie. And if we run with that comparison, then I guess War of Gods is the Endgame equivalent.
This book is “epic” on a ridiculous level. The sheer scale of the conflict is hard to put into words. We’re talking about a traditional epic fantasy style final battle, but one where almost every participant is a legend of myth or of religion. It is a literal war between gods.
With so much build-up and foreshadowing over the course of the last three books, I’m thrilled to say that Ashton stuck the landing. This last battle is exciting, multi-faceted, and ties off a whole lot of loose ends and character arcs. The last third of the book is pretty much entirely dedicated to the war. Fi, Zeke, Peter, Tanuki, Baphomet… they’re all involved. They all have their parts to play, and I never really felt that any one perspective was less interesting than another.
After the manic, high-speed action of book two, War of Gods takes a bit of time to catch its breath in the beginning stages. The first two thirds of the book are essentially build-up. We visit Asgard (yes!), Fi and Zeke have a bit of a training montage, and there are a few skirmishes as the characters get prepared and moved into place for the grand finale.
Now, I’m a huge fan of slow-paced character building moments. I love them. But I have to admit that the first 50% or so felt a bit too slow for me. A big part of that may have been the length of the book — this clocks in at nearly 750 pages, so that’s over 350 pages of slow build — but some of it was that it felt like we were retreading old ground. I felt like some of the emotional notes were hit a little repetitively, and as such they started to lose their impact for me.
But having said that, there were lots of small character moments through the book that I adored. Little hints at past events. A few one-liners here and there to solidify the relationship between friends, family members, or enemies. Given that basically everyone in these books is related, sometimes it could be all of these at once.
If you haven’t read these books before, and are looking for something along the lines of a wildly epic urban fantasy series, then I can only recommend the Paternus trilogy. If you’ve already enjoyed the first two and are looking forward to getting stuck into the final volume, I can only imagine you’ll have a good time.
We received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thank you to Dyrk Ashton for the review copy!
Paternus: War of Gods releases on the 23rd of June, 2020.
