A Time of Dread: 1 (Of Blood & Bone)

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He is the son of a trapper but has grown up knowing very little about his mysterious father or long-dead mother. While the early tone set for AToD feels much darker than the one of tFatF, themes of love, friendship, honour, family, and of course truth and courage are still ever present, and still form the foundation of this writing that has grown from strength to strength, book by book.

The Kadoshim's leader, Asroth is frozen in metal within the Ben-Elim's stronghold but that doesn't mean his faithful aren't out there plotting, sacrificing innocents and boiling up some horrid actions that could equate to A Time of Dread.He could have easily thought back on Drem’s childhood and at least given us some sort of connection to Drem’s past and his character outside of just following Drem himself. This includes things like graphic content (blood, gore, torture, murder, rape), and explicit sexual content. I don’t know if it’s because I was so attached to Corban as a character or what, but I felt like his story should have been told more like Corban’s was.

It’s safe to say that my experience reading this book was enhanced immensely because of my knowledge on the world of the Banished Lands. But after I finished the book, I have to tip my hat to Gwynne for really bringing things around and giving me simultaneously something similar but different. We’re a collaborative review site run by volunteers who love Fantasy, Sci-fi, Horror, and everything in-between.Gwynne delivers adrenaline-filled fight scenes with characters you care about, and the outcome never feels certain, that aforementioned dread is convincing, you feel that characters you care about really might not make it. Friendship and family, honor and loyalty are still as central themes as gore, fights and epic battles in John’s books. The story places readers within the Land of the Faithful approximately 120 years after the conclusion of the novel Wrath, which was an epic, brutal, and fulfilling climax to one of my favourite ever fantasy series.