James Islington: The Shadow of what was lost (2016, Orbit)
Published Sept. 6, 2016 by Orbit.
This is one of my favorite series, for several reasons, including the deep philosophical underpinnings (although those are pretty minor in this book), the characters that you feel like you really get to know throughout the series, and the interesting magic system and world.
Didn't like the world building. Fantasy random name generator word salad and lots of inconsistencies.
In 2017 I added the series to my to read list and patiently waited for it to complete before starting. In those two years I have seen numerous endorsements and recommendations for this series online (r/fantasy) or in store. I was sufficiently hyped to read this story.
And if we're judging a book by the cover...it's gorgeous. The art on all three books is simple, connected and beautiful. To say I have been anxious to start this story would be an understatement.
After years of waiting and significant excitement around the series I am happy to report it was all justified!
Everyone has a darker nature, Caeden. Everyone. Good men fear it, and evil men embrace it. Good men are still tempted to do the wrong thing, but they resist those urges.
The story starts in a school setting and immediately got a Kingkiller Chronicles feeling (which is an homage …
In 2017 I added the series to my to read list and patiently waited for it to complete before starting. In those two years I have seen numerous endorsements and recommendations for this series online (r/fantasy) or in store. I was sufficiently hyped to read this story.
And if we're judging a book by the cover...it's gorgeous. The art on all three books is simple, connected and beautiful. To say I have been anxious to start this story would be an understatement.
After years of waiting and significant excitement around the series I am happy to report it was all justified!
Everyone has a darker nature, Caeden. Everyone. Good men fear it, and evil men embrace it. Good men are still tempted to do the wrong thing, but they resist those urges.
The story starts in a school setting and immediately got a Kingkiller Chronicles feeling (which is an homage to The Magicians and Harry Potter) and this was a comfortable place to begin.
The similarities ceased there as the plot kicked off right away and a location change was introduced. Immediately the story became more akin to Wheel of Time or Lord of the Rings, and again, I'm one hundred percent on board with an unlikely and resistant lead being thrust in to a larger story they don't understand with stakes beyond their imagination.
Like all fantasy novels you start with an unknown history, religions, magic classifications and tension among people and the enjoyment of a story is how much you learn and when. If the definition of an Augur is necessary you will learn it when it's required.
The Shadow of What Was Lost had a learning curve but information was provided at a steady pace and carried me along the story. I felt that new information was provided consistently but there was a sense of a larger mystery being teased.
Then the story ramped up and things escalated significantly...the learning curve got steep in a big way. There were numerous layers of complexity added and the story changed from someone on a jog to an outright sprint. I followed along as best I could (not knowing if I was missing information or more was to come) and in the process I got hooked.
Islington was able to provide cookie crumb trail of information, but there was more effort on groundwork for future payoffs than supporting a first time reader. Conversations, character meetings and references to "have we met before" indicate the larger scope at play. A story being complex doesn't guarantee I will enjoy it, nor should the story be complex just because...and The Shadow of What Was Lost seems to walk that fine line and for now I'm in favor of how it was delivered.
This is a story that would benefit from a re-read and I expect the rest of the series to go that way. I had to continually remind myself who was who, what their relation was to others and what abilities they have. Names and locations blurred together and if there was one negative about this story it would be that a little more handholding could have helped but I appreciate it wasn't overdone either.
When a book includes a map I may refer to it at the start but that's it. The first few days of reading The Shadow of What Was Lost I had the map from Islington's website nearby and referenced it frequently. I'm not sure if this was by choice (wanting to be more involved in the story) or a subtle trick Islington played on me and encouraged me to check locations.
Islington does reference regions of land, their diversity of laws and beliefs, and perhaps this was enough for me to be encouraged to look at the map and understand who was where at a given time. I can think of only a few other lands/books where a map was as integral as it is now, which would include Westeros (ASOIAF), Roshar (Stormlight) or Randland (Wheel of Time).
Also, The Shadow of What Was Lost was brought to you by the word companionable. When it showed up the second time I thought it was an unusual choice, and it appeared a few more times throughout the book. On a re-read it will be like tracking how many times you find Waldo.
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p.s. The draft review functionality has been in Goodreads for a few months but this is the first time I felt it necessary to work on a review while reading the book and that is why this post is a bit more thorough than my usual fare.
Many people compare this series with Wheel of Time and I agree that that comparison is fair, in that both series' are deeply flawed and I ended up not liking them. The whole teenage wunderkind trope is, at least for me, a thing of the past. On top of that the characters in The Shadow of What Was Lost stay quite bland. It's always about their powers and not about their actual characters. There's a lot of world building in this book and instead of the characters showing agency and leaving their mark, they just seem part of the building.
I can see why people would enjoy this book, but it's not for me.
Many people compare this series with Wheel of Time and I agree that that comparison is fair, in that both series' are deeply flawed and I ended up not liking them. The whole teenage wunderkind trope is, at least for me, a thing of the past. On top of that the characters in The Shadow of What Was Lost stay quite bland. It's always about their powers and not about their actual characters. There's a lot of world building in this book and instead of the characters showing agency and leaving their mark, they just seem part of the building.
I can see why people would enjoy this book, but it's not for me.
Difficult to decide how to rate this; the amount of exposition required to tell the story is not well done, but the eventual world is interesting and compelling, I'll be reading the rest of it
Significant and successful variation of the conventional quest fantasy.
Well, the last 20% was somewhat redeeming, but I still felt like the story overall lacked a certain, I dunno, something.
DNF.
