As the story starts we meet a young healer nun, Alessia, who treats all injured the same whichever side they are on in the war. When a Lord comes to their place of healing and slaughters all those deemed to be on the 'other side' the Mother (who is the Head of the healer nuns) decides to take the side of the Lord and only treat those on his 'side'.
Alessia cannot accept this so she leaves to do what she feels is right and treat all. On her travels she meets a farmer, Ulnoth, who has lost his family to the war. Together they gather a raggle-taggle bunch of misfits and decide it is time to end the war.
I must say this book was a lot more brutal and gruesome than I was expecting (not that I'm complaining - War IS brutal and gruesome and I like my fiction to feel real), definitely firmly in the Grimdark camp.
The characters were, for the most part, interesting and worth feeling invested in. The story drifted a little in the middle but the ending had me back on board.
So, if you are a fan of Grimdark this is certainly one worth looking at.
Recommended 3.8/5*
Thanks as always to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the tour, to Flame Tree Press for providing the review copy and please, if you can, have a look at the posts by the other bloggers on the tour (below)
Thanks for the blog tour support Andy x
ReplyDelete