Pariah's Lament; Richie Billing

“Pariah’s Lament” is a fantasy tale full of political intrigue and warfare, but perhaps the most interesting thing about this book is that it is part of a universe that is shared by several other authors all with individual stories to tell. I’ve read books with multiple authors before, and have heard of some romance books that are written by other authors in a shared universe, but this is the first time I came across such a thing in a traditional fantasy novel. We start our journey with a failed assassination attempt on the leader of a country, the Keeper to which one of our main characters is an advisor to. And while they are attempting to figure out who was behind the assassination attempt and all the machinations around that, we also get the story of a young woman, an outcast amongst her village, who is snatched away by an ancient race desperate for her help in preserving what is left of their people. These two groups need each other to survive, even if they don’t realize it until close to half way through the book…

---

While the concept of a shared world with multiple authors is an interesting one, I don’t know how well it worked for this particular novel. I haven’t read any of the other books in this world, so I don’t know where the world is originally set up, or the start of the story, if you will. While all these books can be read individually, the reader is, supposedly, in for a treat if they read them all to see how they are all connected. But without knowing where to start, I’m not sure how that works. Ultimately, I just felt like I got plopped into the second book in a series and was playing catch up. Eventually that feeling went away, but it does take a bit so the book felt slow to me at times as I was constantly wondering how the two different story-lines were supposed to be connected. Once that all gets laid out the book really does fly by and I vastly enjoyed the final confrontation, but it just took me a bit to get to that point.

The book has some very typical fantasy tropes and beats, which I personally like, but it’s main focus is its character driven story, which is even better. We get to watch Edvar and Isy really come into their own which is a treat made doubly exciting with the high stakes that they have to deal with, and then excel at in order to survive. I thought the conflict between the two Keepers was a bit too simplistic given the war they engage in, but that just may be me, and I wish we had seen more of Vil so I could have connected to him more before the end of the story. The plot itself may be a little forgettable (which isn’t helped by the slow start to the book, hence the 4 stars), but the characters were unforgettable! All in all, if you like political intrigue and warfare wrapped up in a fantasy world, then you’ll enjoy this book and the others in its shared world. And thanks to the author for providing me a copy for an honest review!