Knight's Shadow

I am utterly in love with this series! If I wasn't hooked after reading Traitor's Blade late last year Knight's Shadow has stolen my heart completely. I am in awe of the wonderful storytelling in these books and right about now I'm wishing that I could do nothing more in this world than become a Greatcoat.

Yes, less than a month after I finished Traitor's Blade I delved back into Sebastien de Castell's wonderful Greatcoats series about the adventures of musketeer-esque friends Falcio, Kest and Brasti as they travel their country trying to put into action the promises gained from them by their now dead King. Picking up immediately after the ending of Book 1 we are immediately back into the story of the 3 brave soldiers trying to now put the dead King's daughter on the throne and save their country and put an end to the inequalities in their land. They know they will need to try and overcome the scheming and dangerous Duke's in their land and fight to do so whilst still being regarded as traitors.

Initially, it took me a few chapters to get back into the swing of things, to refresh my memory of what had happened in the explosive exploits of Book 1 but once I had cleared things up it and the action started to pick up this book was absolutely non-stop. If we thought there was political intrigue in Traitor's Blade well Knight's Shadow takes it to a whole new level. Someone is murdering the Duke's of Tristia and their families and Falcio, Kest and Brasti find themselves with the finger pointing at them. Who is trying to start a civil war and why? We travel Tristia with our Greatcoats as they try to stop the assassinations before they occur and find out just who is behind it.

Our circle of Greatcoats grows in this book, we add more allies to the little band of 3 giving us more context in which to view our heroes and the way they interact. The other thing I loved about Castell's writing in this book is the way in which he brings smaller characters from Book 1 and enhances their story for us. He doesn't simply say that the villain is all bad, he gives us more context and light and shade so we can see the complexities of their situation and how they can be redeemable. Also how he can take a small character and allow them to shine and be the hero, meaning someone who has perhaps been featured a small amount across both books leaves you feeling welled up and emotional when their story plays out.

Castell makes no compromises when it comes to outlining the more gruesome parts of this book, he doesn't shy away from violence and yet he never makes you feel uncomfortable with the amount or nature of it. There's lots of swordfights and battles in this book to give us plenty of departures and moments for our heroes to shine but for me, the star part is the wonderful political manoeuvring that Falcio manages throughout. This is my all time favourite thing to read, the careful managing of the different players on the board, the tiny moves that are made to move everyone to the position in which you want them. Castell's series is proving a master at this and for that reason, I am one of it's biggest fans.

I absolutely cannot wait to read the last 2 books in this quartet and already have them on my shelf ready to pick up in the weeks ahead and it says something that already I'm worried I'm going to miss my 3 Greatcoats when I'm done and am wishing that maybe he might release a fifth?

Sebastien de Castell has managed to find a wonderful niche within fantasy with his Greatcoats series. The best description of it is the Three Musketeers but fantasy. His world is well developed, even if the villains are a bit of caricature at times, but then if you look at real history those caricatures can seem remarkably apt. The Musketeers style setup allows for a fantastic buddy relationship to form the heart and soul of the books and the character relationships really are the highlight of the stories.

Knight's Shadow follows on immediately from Traitor's Blade, with our heroes trying to unite the rest of the Tristia against the northern dukes but end up caught up in some larger conspiracies. The commentary on class system inherent in the original Musketeers is still present here, along with some interesting musings on the right to rule. Knight's Shadow keeps up the excellence of the first book and drives the story along very satisfactorily. I look forward to continuing my exploration of Tristia with the next book!

I have got to say that the second book of The Greatcoats had me going wow and whoa at various points throughout Falcio's second adventure. De Castell has ramped up the action to eleventy stupid and it is more like a summer blockbuster.
This is a bigger book in every way, it's got more pages, more Falcio, more plots and is more expansive in everyway.
The second book starts shortly after the first book, with Falcio dealing with the effects of the Neatha poisoning that he suffered at the end of Traitors Blade. Whilst Falcio is experiencing the after effects of the Neatha poisoning, we learn more about the Greatcoats and Falcio's relationship with the King through a series of hallucinations that he experiences. As a reader, you are not entirely sure whether these are true recollections or whether they are how Falcio saw his relationship with the king as throughout the book there are different viewpoints of the kings actions and some of them are opposing to Falcio's view of his beloved king. What is certainly evident is the king was not a perfect godlike figure and that there were some aspects of his plans that were definitely shady.
I think one of the best bits of this book is the relationship between the three main characters, Kest certainly gets fleshed out a lot more in this book and Brasti provides the comic relief, except when he doesn' t.
However, this is a darker book than the first and at times is quite grueling. Not only from Falcio's own battle with his mortality and Kest coming to grips with what it actually means to be the Saint of Swords, but Brasti's own struggles with the cause that they have undertaken and the effect that it has on the lower classes of the world.
There are some parts of it that made me wince as they were extremely grueling, and when you get to it you will see what I mean.
It's very rare that a second book is better than the first, but this was. Now onto the third installment.

Even more torture and more luck.

Fun(?) fact: I started reading this book first by accident. After many references to previous events, I finally stopped and went back to the first one before finishing this one.

The torture is not bad, it just felt like an aside to the book. Like, lets stop our main story for a moment while I describe all the ways the protagonist will suffer. And after the torture, instead of a long and hard recovery with many consequences, he just shrugs it off and goes on to save the world.

This book is of same quality as the previous one. We get to see our 4th Greatcoat, and the heroes are hard pressed to step down from their high horses and be pragmatic every now and then in order to get things done. That includes an association with a dubiously moral ally. The protagonist is is still a self righteous ass, but still a likeable one.

We get to learn more about the fate of some of the disbanded Greatcoats, and the King's last tasks for them. We also get to see the consequences of some of the actions taken in the previous book. There is also some magic!

There were still more luck then I would have liked, but the author does try to make things convincing. I did hate how Falcio was able to overcome impossible odds more then one time, with nothing more then his “sheer will”.

Wow. This was an incredible read. I read de Castell's Spellslinger series first, which I enjoyed very much, before moving on to the Greatcoat series. Joe Jameson is an excellent narrator for both series.
But Greatcoats is impressing me in a way that Spellslinger didn't. The depth of characters is shared between the books, but this book routinely took turns I didn't expect. de Castell leads you to thinking one thing will happen and following a very different path indeed.

There is a detailed graphic scene near the end that I had to skip through (CW: sexual assault & violence). Honestly ordinarily that would be a deal breaker for me, and I understand if it is for anyone else. But the narrative really pushes me forward to keep reading and seeing what's going on down the line for this cast.

Sitting down, staring at the screen, 15mins of battery left, warning like crazy........yet I can't seem to order my thought exactly...........Book Two by Mr. Sebastien de Castell.............you almost made me cry in public(shielding your face with the left hand so nobody would notice you finidhed your cup of coffee almost an hour ago)........THAT! my dear friends is how a book is written!!!

What makes a human truly HUMAN??? This book made me realize that the characters were more humane than me!!! Tortured, broken, bereft of hope, and yet Falcio Val Mond still fought............Readers please do read the book........if Book One was good, this one WAS WAY WAY BETTER(notice the constant capitalization of some words??? Suffice to say my humane side came out to play after reading this, but afterwards..........”snicker.....heee heee heee in you go humanity back to your beautiful cage”)..........

The Greatcoats are coming!!!! Book Three you better be worth this...........................................

The shitstorm continues in this book. It's not enough that the sadistic and perfectly insane Trin decided to be queen, Falcio is dying of the poison he barely survived in the previous book, sainthood is starting to make Kest go insane, Brasti breaks down, Aline is in constant danger, but someone decided to start murdering the dukes and their whole families and the signs point to the old Greatcoats. Seems like nobody can catch a break in this damn country, eh?

This was something. When I say something, I mean REALLY dark, more than the first, with hilarious moments, and action galore. Thing got much more complicated as well, which is interesting, I am really looking forward to how the author is going to solve this, because at the moment it seems everyone just decided to burn the country to the ground and restart from there. Seriously, if you want to see clear cut good and bad, don't even bother with this.
Personally I enjoy that. Characters with potential for good seem to come up with the worst possible things to do. Everything leads to things turning worse and worse. To be honest, that is one of my favourite elements in the series; that even the best intentions can and will often lead to the absolute worst.

In this one all three of our guys are having their own issues. They all get tested in their ways, have to face their issues, really think about what they are doing with their lives. The same goes for the accompanying girls. A lot of that happens towards the end of the book, so we won't see too much of the results, which.... yeah, that part makes this book feel a bit like setting things up for the next. I'm not saying it is a bad book, but a lot of their achievements will come to their results later.

So now for the soapbox time. Skip if you are so inclined. I warned you.
Nowadays everyone blabbers about female characters and how we absolutely NEED more, while they are inventing ridiculous guidelines. Female characters always need to be flattering to our whole gender or someone will cry sexism.
My opinion? To hell with that. Females have the capacity for the full range of good AND bad characteristics and that is not an insult, but a great thing. When we are good, it's not because of the lack of other possibility and us just being born good, but because we decided to do it and kept that goodness.
Here we finally have some females with the whole scale. Kind, caring, patient, but also sadistic, full of revenge, too hot headed. All.
Now I just hope Sebastien De Castell is as brave as some of his characters and will keep them that way and not dance back and claim women's bad decisions and flaws are always the men's faults.

All in all, this was good. I hope the next one will finally not have torture scenes (they... get a bit old, not gonna lie), but other than that I am looking forward to it. The end of the book makes it obvious that our characters have some huge work ahead of them. The world got developed in this one more (the Dashini assassins, oh my gooood), now they need to start fixing all the issues with the already existing stuff. Maybe finally they will actually have the power to make some progress and not just stumble from one life or death situation to the next.

There is one element I am not wild about, though. Ethalia, Falcio's love interest. I personally don't really love romance, it just doesn't interest me and this one feels a bit nonsensical as well. Sure, she helps him and she's a kind lady, but this gigantic love after actually spending maybe a day together was a bit... annoying, I guess. Oh, well. I can live with that.

Have a nice day and avoid all the conspiracies!

Knights Shadow

What a book. I really enjoyed reading this. This one picks up right where the 1st book left off. I think the 1st book is perfect and this book is a really good follow up book. Sebastian De Castell did amazing work in this book.

The name of this book should have been How much can we make Falcio suffer, because boy does he suffer in this one. From the Greatcoats Lament his friends all being forced to leave him. All coming back to him in the end though was great. The ups and downs. Thinking it would be a murder mystery then a hunt. So many misdirects. Can't believe I let Shuran trick me. I do wish we had 1 example of a good honorable Knight thoughVery sad that Ugh, died, but I'm not spoiling his name here.CAWPILECharacters.Falcio is our main character again, but this time we see him go through a lot more pain and suffering. We see him put away his past and start moving forward with his life. Again the relationships between Kest, Brasti and Falcio are 100% legit and realistic. All the characters have their own motivations and reasons and really no one feels like AtmosphereCreative and realistic world the villages the dukes, all work to create a world that seems real.WritingHis writing is as beautiful as ever. And with just as many powerful poignant one liners as the first book.PlotPlot makes sense. Isn't too Convoluted and makes sense with whats going on. The Tailor deciding to hire the unblooded Dashani was a bit crazy of an idea for me. InvestmentCouldn't put this book down. In trouble multiple times because I was reading instead of watching daughterLogicNo issues for me with what happened in the bookEnjoymentSo much enjoyment even at the same time as seeing all the sadness and suffering that Falcio had to go throughMiscLove Trattori and Bardetti --- something special UGH trying to be better than a horseEthalia—Pretty much everything here.Love isn't a cage▪ Valiana stood shakily. ‘I . . . no, your Grace. I do not want to rule, nor do I wish to hold the throne in any way.'‘Good,' Meillard said. ‘Then you're perfect for the jobThe Word is VALOURSpare Key to Rijou Prisonam getting seriously tired of men who murder children preaching to me about honourSomewhere in the world lives a God or a Saint who took it upon himself to invent magic. I plan on killing him some day.THE GREATCOATS LAMENT
I will be talking about it on Libromancy https://libromancy.podbean.com/

Somewhere between a 4 and a 5 actually but what the hell, I am not complaining. Sebastien was happily plodding towards a 4 star rating when suddenly the chapter Knights Lament happened and everything ratcheted up a notch. So we continue to trail the three musketeers of the modern era across the content having now found one of the treasures they were seeking. But its now the individual trials that each go through and how it all comes together that takes this series to the next level. Add to that the fact that the endgame is not very easily guessed means you have a nice little package. Still confused about the assassins though! A short wait till the next book hopefully