Genre:
Historical Fantasy
Blurb:
They think they’ve killed the last of us…
981 AD. The Viking King of Dublin is dead. His young widow, Gormflaith, has ambitions for her son – and herself – but Ireland is a dangerous place and kings tend not to stay kings for long. Gormflaith also has a secret. She is one of the Fomorians, an immortal race who can do fire-magic. She has kept her powers hidden at all costs, for there are other immortals in this world – like the Tuatha Dé Danann, a race of warriors who are sworn to kill Fomorians.
Fódla is one of the Tuatha Dé Danann with the gift of healing. Her kind dwell hidden in a fortress, forbidden to live amongst the mortals. Fódla agrees to help her kin by going to spy on Brian Boru, a powerful man who aims to be High King of Ireland. She finds a land on the brink of war – a war she is desperate to stop. However, preventing the loss of mortal lives is not easy with Ireland in turmoil and the Fomorians now on the rise…
Review:
I first came across The Children of God and Fighting Men within a month or two of it releasing as a lot of the booktubers and bloggers I follow were discussing it, as soon as I read the blurb I knew I wanted to read it. Unfortunately due to me not reading as much as I used to and mood reading I’m only now getting to it, do I wish I read this sooner……..YES!
Books with historical elements are something I very rarely pick up due to two reasons, I have to be interested in that aspect of history and I have to be in the right mindset to read it. That second reason is why it took me so long to read this, I wish I had trusted my gut more and picked this up sooner because within a few chapters I was hooked.
This book is classed as a Historical Fantasy however it also mythology in it, could this actuality be called Mythorical Fantasy. I can imagine writing a historical fantasy book being difficult enough as you need to keep to certain historical accuracies while also introducing fantastical twists, adding mythology only complicates this. Shauna Lawless has crafted a beautiful story with such a fine balance and its clear Shauna has taken a lot of care to find that perfect balance for the book.
This a multi POV book focusing on two main characters, Fodla (Foe-la) and Gormflaith (Gorm-la). I found the chapters in this book very well constructed and not overly long but also Shauna isn’t afraid to end a chapter on a cliffhanger and leave you wanting more, I found this out the hard way after reading late a couple of nights.
Some may be wondering why I chose to add the phonetic spelling of character name in the paragraph, this is because thanks to Shauna I know how. There are many times when reading books I’m unsure how to pronounce names, I usually end up shortening them or determining how I think it they should be said. For this I didn’t need because at the start of the book Shauna has added a list of character names with phonetic spellings alongside a quick description of who they are. There was many occasions while reading this book I was stumped on how to pronounce a name and having this quick reference saved so much time, also because I knew how a name should be said I felt the book some how flowed that much better.
I think its time I wrapped this up before I start to gush about The Children of Gods and Fighting Men. Whether you are a lover of fantasy, history or mythology I think you will love this book as it does everything with great finesse and care, it likes no Historical Fantasy book I have read before. I already have the second Gael Song book, The Words of Kings and Prophets waiting for me on my shelf and I am looking forward to reading it.
Shauna Lawless website / blog:
The Literary Raven Book Reviews 