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Title: Princess of Blood
Series: The God Fragments #2
Author: Tom Lloyd
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 545
Format: Digital Edition
| Synopsis: |
The Cards head to another independent city state ostensibly as bodyguards for the Ambassador, but with Toil telling them to “be prepared”.
Some fool scholar has opened a mystery in the city of Jarrazir that leads down into a duegar maze of mythic proportions. Legends hint of a stash of god fragments, but that is odd as the duegar pre-date the fall of the gods.
Sotorian Bade, working for the Knight Charnel in his role as relic hunter, leads a force of knights underground to recover the fragments. General Faril is leading a very visible attack against the city to distract everyone from Bade.
But Toil isn’t distracted. She has a vendetta against Bade since he left her to die in the Underdark all those years ago. With the very reluctant blessing of the Nobility of Jarrazir, Toil and some of the Cards head underground, along with the surviving student of the aforementioned fool scholar. Now in a race with Bade, both groups will be tested to the utmost in all areas: magic, brains and brawn.
Bade successfully carries off the god fragments but Toil realizes there is a greater treasure and the 7 survivors are imbued with some sort of magic that ties them together. Once upon the surface, they must work together, with the remaining Cards and other mercenary groups to throw back the Knights Charnel. This they successfully do.
Now Anatim must figure out just what his Cards are becoming and if it’s something he still wants to be in charge of.
| My Thoughts: |
I enjoyed this as much as the first book. On the plus, there were no “slow” times like I experienced previously. On the minus side, Lloyd goes into perverse immorality here. Sadly, I am letting my enjoyment dictate the outcome instead of dnf’ing this like I’ve done other books with such content. I’m sure it will happen again so I’m already preparing myself for stopping this series at the next such instance.
Lloyd likes to write a lot of setup. While the Maze opens in the first pages, neither the Cards or Bade actually go underground until after the 50% mark. It worked this time but there were times I felt like telling him to “get on with the story”. The maze reminded me of the movie Cube, just not quite so spectacularly violent and grotesque. I’m ok with that though. Sadly, the whole time in the maze felt a bit rushed. I do wish there had been more fighting or traps or monsters or something. Less backstory for that wretched Toil and more Maze death.
Lynx didn’t feel nearly as much the main character as he did in the first book. It seemed like Toil kind of bulled her way in and tried to take over. I don’t mind her as Lynx’s love interest or as a side character, but I don’t care for her as a main character. She’s simply “too much”. Lynx is a bit more believable. In a world where pieces of gods are used to make bullets I mean * rolls eyes at self *
We do find out a little bit of the history of this world and the fact that the gods might have been duegar. My initial thought on learning this was “what is this going to do to the psyche of the people if they learn their gods were nothing but jumped up dwarves?”. I have a feeling Lloyd is simply going to ignore that aspect of things. Just like he’s pretty much not written how the gods being dead and their carcasses being used affects people.
This does continue to get the profanity tag as well. F-bombs are used like mage bullets it seems.
★★★★☆
Bookstooge's Reviews on the Road 
God fragments? Hmmm, sounds interesting. I’m imagining bits of flesh and bone but I have a strong feeling that’s not what the author means. 🙂
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Well, from what I can tell, they are crystals that are a different color for each god. The crystals used to make up the gods’ bodies…
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Ah. So it’s a slightly less gruesome version of my interpretation. Crystals, you say? It must have been quite uncomfortable being a god 😉
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Well, they were dwarves, so I think they turned to stone/crystal when they died?
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Whoa, that’s pretty interesting. But it’s strange that the author hasn’t used up an info-dump or two to explain this strange phenomenon.
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I suspect it will play a bigger role in a future book.
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Oh, i love this cover so much! Reminds me of Guild Wars 2 a lot!
Long set ups are not really my thing, but i did notice it’s a thing for a lot of fantasy books. I think this is one of the reasons i kinda struggle with this genre. I want them to just get to the point 😀
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I’ve shortlisted this cover for the end of the month cover love. It is gorgeous 😀
Most of the time I don’t mind long setups. Authors like Dickens, etc have trained me for that. But sometimes I just want the kickass action to start NOW 🙂
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This is a series that has been on my wishlist for a long time and now I want to start more than ever. If your enjoyment can overcome your revulsion for some of the more unsavory content, I guess that says something about Lloyd’s talents.
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It also tells just how tired I am of fighting this issue. I am so sick of giving up series that I like and it is just discouraging.
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Ahhh my TBR gets longer and longer… 😉
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You’re welcome 😉
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So is that an insect made out of lightning on the cover? Because that’s what I keep seeing it as.
Also, a book version of the movie Cube sounds interesting, but also too intense for me. Glad you enjoyed it, though!
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It is supposed to be a spider I think. The actual description in the book is just a bunch of legs all coming together into a ball and it’s pretty much just energy. Probably made it more “spidery” on the cover to look cooler.
This wasn’t gruesome or mentally wearing like the Cube was. Thankfully.
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Eeeew. Lightning spider. :p
Yeah, the Cube had some interesting concepts, but was just gross.
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The idea of that maze and its similarity with The Cube (a movie I could never watch in its entirety, because it frayed my nerves…) is equally intriguing AND frightening. I will have to see which emotion wins… 🙂
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Thankfully, this book wasn’t gruesome like Cube was. Nor was this filled with despicable psychopaths who you wanted to die. It was filled with psychopaths, but some of them we like 😀
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Likable psychopaths? I’m in. 😉 I hadn’t heard of this series at all (have just gone back and read your previous reviews for books 1 and 1.5), but it’s on the list now. Thank you! 😀
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You are welcome 🙂
Yeah, a mercenary band of misfits really works on so many levels.
I’m pretty sure Llloyd is an indie or a hybrid, so visibility is a big thing, ’cause like you noted, you’d never even heard of this.
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This cover looks good. Story premise sounds good too. Excuse the late replies, getting back into reading mode…
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The cover is awesome, isn’t it? It’s definitely in the running for best cover of this month.
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I still remember how much appreciation you had for the previous books, especially Stranger of Tempest. But dude… That cover is amazing! I’d have easily bought this based on the cover alone.
By the way, did you know there was a book 0.5 called The Man With One Name? Since you enjoyed book 1.5, maybe you’d enjoy this one too hahah
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I actually have The Man with One Name on tap. I thought it was 2.5, so good to know it is a prequel. That would have been a surprise. And I don’t like surprises 😀
These covers are completely awesome, aren’t they? I should probably investigate who the artist is…
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