A city ruled by Gods, a mortal champion, a misfit girl and a disobedient dragon…
Stolen from his home, Corthie Holdfast has arrived in the City of the Eternal Siege as a new Champion.
He must fight alongside the Blades, whose lives are dedicated to the defence of the City against the hordes of monstrous Greenhides; or die at the hands of the Gods who rule.
Maddie Jackdaw, a young Blade, faces her last chance. Thrown out of every unit defending the City, either she takes on a new role, or she will be sent to the Rats, a company of misfits given the perilous tasks beyond the Great Walls.
Her new role, if she takes it, will bring her face to face with her deepest fears, for beneath the walls, in a secret and hidden lair, lies a dragon, imprisoned and waiting…
Jared
The world is reduced to a handful of cities, continuously besieged by a flood of ‘greenhides’. Humanity has divided into a combination of functional tribes and blooded nobility. They are ruled by walking gods, complete with divine powers and a (very) weak sense of responsibility for their human subjects. Also, dragons.
The Mortal Blade is not particularly interested in exploring the deeper repercussions of its setting. The caste system is vaguely Bad, the gods are sulky teenagers with longer timelines, and the siege is a chance to make stuff go boom.
Corthie is the book’s ‘star’. He is an extradimensional-ish dudebro who has maxxed-out Combat Invincibility Scores and is immune to all Evil Magic. He can’t get food poisoning and he’s Respectful to Women. Even when The Mortal Blade isn’t featuring his direct POV, the book still revolves around Corthie and his actions. If someone brought Corthie’s plot-armoured perfection into a D&D campaign, you’d accuse them of shagging the DM.
By contrast, The Mortal Blade also has another, smaller character with a very different perspective. Daniel is the last scion of one of the city’s noble families. His conniving mother is trying to arrange a marriage for him, his family’s rivals are out to destroy him, and he has a terrible case of ‘wrong place, wrong time’ when it comes to his military assignments. Daniel’s imperfect and trapped in challenging circumstances. He is, by far, the most empathetic character in the book. Unfortunately, he is also an extremely minor one. In terms of plot, theme and tone, Daniel feels like he’s in a very different book from the rest of The Mortal Blade.
Besieged cities and petulant gods are a tempting premise, and the (slight) use of Daniel shows its rich thematic potential. However, The Mortal Blade is largely devoted to providing a stage for its superheroic and uncharismatic star.
(3/10)
Kopratic
My review of this book will be short because I don’t have much to say about it that differs from what’s already been talked about. I thought the writing style was alright. However, I was bored with most everything else. Nothing really held my attention. Unfortunately, I was not the right audience for this book.
(4/10)
Adam
The Mortal Blade is a fast paced epic fantasy in a city beset by rampaging monstrous hordes. A god, a mortal champion, a young noble officer and a troubled soldier get caught up in events that could tear the city apart.
The Mortal Blade sets up several interesting storylines and then blasts through them at pace. I found the worldbuilding unique enough to draw me in. I liked the idea of the god from the losing side of a godswar trying to do good within the short leash the winning side have her on, and uncovering conspiracy from within. And the troubled soldier forced into helping take care of a dangerous secret. Even the young noble gets a storyline that surprised me. I would agree with Jared that the champion Corthie felt like a favoured player character in an RPG.
I don’t think the majority of the storylines lived up to their potential however, and the pace of the book often comes at the expense of character development – a disruptive event might happen to a character, and we’ll only see anything from their perspective weeks later in the narrative, after any of the heightened emotions would be gone. I also found that the dialogue was pretty weak and the prose likewise.
There were a couple of twists at the end that I found to be pretty well set up, but this book is clearly the first part in a much larger saga, with hints towards a much larger universe and an ending that begs to be continued.
Despite my misgivings I feel like this might have been the finalist that I had the most fun with, and I have the feeling that readers looking for a rollercoaster story that can be breezed through will latch onto this.
(6/10)
