My brother asked me how it was when I was about a quarter of the way into it, and I told him it was nothing original, but nothing terribly unoriginal. Even after finishing the book that still seems to be the case. Don't get me wrong, I really liked the book. It was good, but it just had all the classic tropes.

It did have excellent worldbuilding, and showed the reader the world without a huge info-dump. Scholes never had to resort to a five page long reflection by Neb to give us the history of the world. I liked that a lot, the fact that we had to learn as we go along, but we did learn, we didn't stay confused the whole book long.

It was interesting to see the technology of the Androfrancines alongside "magick", though most of the magick did seem very science-based. The powders and potions could simply have been discovered by chemists and passed down as "magick". Some things were more mystical, like the Seven Cacophonic Deaths of the evil wizard (X'Hum Y'zir something). The metal men and other mechanicals were interesting, and it was cool to see droids alongside medieval kings and armies.

Isaak was a good character, it was really easy to forget he was a robot. This doesn't seem to be the case with the other metal men, they do seem to be machines and little more. It may actually excuse the actions of some of the characters throughout the book. Rudolfo was very careful to be polite at all times to Isaak, and even named him Isaak, which turns out to be a very personal gesture. But other characters like Oriv/Resolute treated Isaak like a second class citizen, like property and nothing more. At first this made him and others look like arrogant jerks, but after seeing the rest of the mechanicals, maybe it's because they have always behaved like property and it's not arrogance. It will be interesting to see if the other mechanicals grow in any way, or if they always stay machines. Them treating Isaak like their leader was interesting, I was expecting him to be an outcast. But an outcast is a human thing, not a robot thing.

Anyways, the rest of the world kind of fell into their place alongside countless other fantasy works. House Li Tam and the Androfrancines were the Bene Gesserit, the Aes Sedai of the world. The Androfrancines had the power and the technology, and House Li Tam was the power behind the throne, pulling strings and guiding the world. I did like the scene between Rudolfo and Vlad Li Tam towards the end, when Vlad was burning the Li Tam private library and leaving the Named Lands.

Neb was the young boy who will become the savior of the world, while the Marsh Folk were the mysterious savages who turn out to be much more. It will be interesting to see where this storyline goes though.



And is it a given that this is all in the far future? That we are the Old World, that the Age of Laughing Madness and Churning Wastes are a result of Nukes or chemical agents? At times it hinted that they had come to a new world, but whether that means another planet or another continent is debatable. The Moon Wizard was hinted at, and it will be interesting to see if that plays a bigger part in the story.

So yeah, I liked the book. I'll be recommending it to others, and following the story. How many books are expected in the series?