Promise of Blood

Promise of Blood is a mix of the French Revolution and magic.

Field Marshal Tamas and his group of powerful Gun Powder Mages overthrow their king who was about to pretty much enslave their people to another nation because the debts were too high. Tamas successfully takes the city for the people and is rather successful at keeping it too. But then trouble comes calling not only from outside forces (the nation they were about to be sold off to, though not in so many words), but also from inside his own group counselors. Tamas is ambushed, kidnapped, severely injured, and almost dies often in this book as he's trying to find out who he can trust.

Adamat is a retired investigator who is hired by Tamas to find out information about a they dying words of cabals they were killing during this coup. Then to investigate who this traitor is among the ranks. But is he able to be trusted too?

Taniel, Tamas' son, is sent with his mute "savage" companion to track down the Privileged, a high powered sorceress, who decimated a portion of Tamas' troops. But there are more things gone one than just being a powerful Privileged. She seems more than just good.

Then also there is Malahi, this mysterious chef who appears out of nowhere, cooks the best food which also appears out of nowhere, and supposes himself a God.

This book actually took me a long time to read, comparatively. There were moments in the middle of a fight when I was willing to put it down and go get a sandwich, which is pretty sad. It seemed very slow going and it was hard to tell where our destinations were. There were few lamp posts in this fog and they seemed very far apart. You could chop the book up into two parts, I guess. Easily based on the "mystery" part that the investigator Adamat and what he finds out. But it felt weird because I didn't know where it was going.

It also got very bloody (hence the title) right off. Much like the French Revolution, there were mass executions of the nobility just so then they couldn't have claim to the throne. It dims down on the gore part as it goes on, so if you don't care for messy scenes and you can muscle through it, it'll get better. Though the fight scenes happen very often. As I said, Tamas gets kidnapped, ambushed, sliced and diced, and gets broken a lot. Though he doesn't heal instantly, so I'll give him that reality. But that was just Tamas, not everyone in this war.

This is not a romantic fantasy story in any real sense of the word. There are five girls who are named and alive in the whole book that aren't background characters. One is just a background character for this book who gets a few lines said mainly to Tamas even though she is Taniel's ex-fiance. Two are seen as crazy and trying to kill everyone. Another is a laundress who gets the most wordage on the page, but there still isn't much of it comparatively to the other characters. And the last is a mute, who is supposed to be mysterious and funny, which I guess she is, but there are other ways to make a girl mysterious without cutting out her tongue.

There is a lot of jumping in this book from different peoples point of view. Which I don't mind, but it had the tendency of shifting the time line a little, I think. It was a very character based book with their decisions making the story go forward. Which is okay, I personally would have wanted more plot points to help me guess where it was going.

It seemed seems the book was based around fighting and food. Lol.

I think it was well written and the mix  of gunpowder and magic is new. The religion that was created was intriguing and I would like to see how that develops more. The world setting and cultures of the people were well developed.

I will probably read the next ones in this trilogy because the characters that were developed were intriguing enough and the world was fantastic. I do hope that the girls do get some more voice and that the mute finds someway to speak through her sorcery powers.