Age of Ash: The Sunday Times bestseller - The Kithamar Trilogy Book 1

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With the help of her friend Sammish, she tracks down those who her brother was working for, whilst Sammish finds those who are opposed to that group. We do have some unique character and place names in Age of Ash but nothing too drastic that tripped me up when reading them. Each of the books in this series, we’ve been told, will cover essentially the same period of time, and only be told from the perspective of different sets of characters. I found myself struggling to connect and actually care about her and instead wanted to spend all of my time with every other character we've met. The character work is good, although I felt some of the more interesting character development was right at the end of the book, so there was little time to enjoy this.

Recommendations: if you love subtle, immersive world-building and highly character-driven novels, then Age of Ash will be right up your alley.Originally a part of the same pick pocket crew as Alys, Sammish’s unrequited love for the main character is what draws her in to the conspiracies surrounding Darro’s death.

Abraham gets plenty of depth out if Kithamar and it feels very real with a lot of depth with different cultures and norms among its inhabitants. I highlighted all those people’s names when I was reading the prologue, and when reading, I kept asking: where are you? She loves to read and has always enjoyed fantasy novels, particularly the very dark and twisty ones with mythical creatures. Age of Ash is a stunningly written, character driven story, centred on thieves, grief, and dark magic.I believe her pay off is worth the journey this book takes, but I actually think it could have used an extra 100-150 pages to really soak in the journey she experiences. Great character work and explorations of grief, family, loyalty, and friendship and I can't wait to see where book 2 goes because I have no clue (though I bet I know who our MC for book 2 is). She has wit, but it’s based on honed survival skills, not on intelligence (and definitely not on the emotional one! During this year, there will be intrigue and conflict and the lives of thousands will be impacted in obvious and not-so-obvious ways.

He has been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy awards, and won the International Horror Guild Award. The Kithamar world is one where people fear magic and those who practice are powerful and few, often unknown. This leads her down a dangerous path, putting her in the employ of a man and a woman from Green Hill—the richest district—and stretching her morals to their limits. I may not always have liked their choices, but I understood the characters and really felt for them and what they went through. I have some mixed feelings about Age of Ash, but a lot of what Daniel Abraham does well still ended up shining through and I thought this was a solid first entry to the series in the end!When Alys' brother is murdered under mysterious circumstances I was initially pretty hooked because it had the potential to be a murder mystery and revenge story. When Alys’s brother Darro is murdered, Alys sets on a journey of discovery and revenge, which leads her down some very treacherous paths. This feels refreshing - moral murkiness may be more realistic, but it also feels a bit overdone at this point - but also feels like it runs counter to the idea of Alys and Sammish being friends divided by a cause; when they realise which cause is good and which is bad, the central conflict effectively vanishes. Little by little we learn quite a few things about Alys, however, it is a while before we spend a full chapter on what life was like when it was just her and her mom. Instead, it’s intimately involved in the story surrounding these two girls and their life in the city.

Ruled by a prince (the term is gender neutral in Kithamar), the city has its share of the poor and disadvantaged. It’s not just that the setting is thoroughly detailed, though it is, but the reader is given a sense of tradition and community that add meaning to the ways in which people live and die, how they celebrate and mourn. This is the first novel in Abraham’s new Kithamar Trilogy and is described as ‘a monumental epic fantasy’.She never expresses her feelings to anyone, nor do we never see any other characters with same-sex attraction to compare it to or know how she would be received in the world at large. He has been nominated for the Nebula and World Fantasy awards, and won the Hugo award and International Horror Guild award.