Book Review: Promise of Blood
This book had it all: a beautiful cover, endorsements by some of my favourite authors, a unique magic system, a grimdark industrial revolution setting… So why was it so bad?
It sometimes happens that you read something early on in a book that sullies your opinion for the remainder. You don the opposite of rose-coloured glasses (s— coloured glasses?). These things are so jarring that no matter how hard you try to get back into the book, how much you try to re-engage with the book and suspend your disbelief, you always have this niggling little voice in the back of your head saying “remember the time the author said that thing?”
I know exactly what that thing was in this book. It was on the second half of page 41, when Adamat (a character who turned out to have the personality of a glass of room-temperature milk) was telling his wife that she would have to leave town because there would be riots soon. Which leads to this heartwarming narrative:
[Wife:] “Why will there be riots?”
[Adamat:] Damned woman. What he’d give for an obedient wife … Adamat watched her for a moment. Her body was more angular than it had once been; sharp elbows and wrinkled skin in place of >soft curves and a gentle, lovely plumpness. The years since his retirement from the force had taken their toll on her, and she was not as beautiful as in her youth… Still… he bit his lower lip as he watched [her] entertaining actions that would need to wait some time.
What on Earth???
I (normally) consider it one of my talents that I am able compartmentalize the good from the bad; that I am not one to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I kept on reading, hoping that the rest of the book would make up for that immersion-breaking idiocy. Unfortunately all 600 pages of this book were filled with writing of a similar kind. Here are some other notes I saved from the book:
… a group of three women were rushing up the path. Taniel didn’t even need to guess who they were. Privileged [wizards] werre magnetic to the opposite sex. Most agreed it was their bearing and power. It was common knowledge that their constant interactions with the Else gave them incredible sex drives, so few Privileged, especially the males, went without a harem.
“Maies left me last month, right after the coup.”
Maies was his sixth wife in twenty years. Adamat couldn’t help but wonder what he’d done this time.
“Are you alright?”
… “Doing fine. An office near the dockyards has it’s perks. I found a pair of twins… I could introduce you-“
“Nineteen? Oh, you? You’re nineteen” Taniel was taken aback. “I always thought you were a kid … Well, damn it, I don’t care how old you are, I don’t want you protecting me” … He licked his lips and wondered what she tasted like. He pushed the thought from his mind. She was a servant, an uneducated savage.
She’s also your friend, Taniel??
“Why do you come to me Olem? I’m not a good prospect. I’ve no family or connections, and you’ve not tried to force yourself on me. I don’t understand you.”
A female secondary character, wondering why a guy is interested in her. She has no family or connections, and he hasn’t tried to rape her, what else could it be????
Ka-poel emerged from the darkness dressed in her buckskins … the buckskins clung to her body, reminding Taniel she was a woman and not just a girl. Something he’d not noticed before.
A yes. Deer skin outfits. The universal symbol of sexiness. Davey Crockett, Sacagawea… the list goes on. Also: how can you be reminded of something you’d not noticed before?
“He was a big man, strong, powerful, and” - he tracked one of Mihail’s female assistants with his eyes as she passed by … “he was very popular with women. He had over four-hundred wives and loved every one of them. Figuratively and literally.”
“Four hundred?” Tamas said. “I could barely handle one.”
“Besides, the [head priest] is a very busy man. We’ll have to go find him at the chapel. What with the orgy this morning, he’s running late for afternoon prayer service.”
I don’t know if the Author was severely mistreated by a woman at some point in his life, but almost every female character in this book is either a concubine, a b—hy wizard, or a cheater. The few female characters that might actually have some personality are given no dialogue. As other reviewers have pointed out, the only female character that might have been interesting (Ka-Poel) is a mute who’s character arc is: Main male character thinks his friend Ka-Poel is a little girl. Main male character discovers Ka-Poel is actually of-age. Game on baby.
I clearly have a chip on my shoulder about the way women are treated in this book, but let’s be honest: this isn’t uncommon in this genre and there are good - albeit maybe not modern - books that have similar problems. I can already hear the “why can’t we have a book about guys for guys?” comments (or I would, if anyone ever commented on my reviews). Well, let’s assume that there is no rampant sexism in this book, or that the rampant sexism is appropriate because everyone knows 19th century Europe was characterized by widespread harems and Napoleon’s 400 wives. Even if this was the case this still isn’t a good book.
The Author challenged himself by starting this book with an event that would typically be the climax of a first book in a series. In the very first chapter readers are thrown directly into a massive, bloody, revolution, and the rest of the book is about the baby-steps of the burgeoning post-revolution government. Unfortunately the book fails to maintain any tension after the first big raising of stakes, and plods along at a donkey’s pace. Not because donkeys are slow, but because the closest metaphor I can make for the pacing of this book is a donkey walking steadily through a forest. There might be treacherous roots, there might be hills, or there might be an evil cabal of wizards trying to summon an old god, but the donkey takes this all in stride and just keeps putting one foot (hoof?) in front of the other. Similarly, most conflicts introduced in this book are either rapidly/easily resolved (Tamas’s kidnapping) or forgotten about completely (Vlora’s infedility) as the characters continue their bland and mostly meaningless journeys from city to castle to ancient ruins. It was almost ridiculous how often the narrative went like “Oh, this mystery is completely explainable by the knowledge that I just happen to possess, good thing you were talking to me at this exact moment” or “Oh my gosh that legend I was told when I was a kid, that you (the reader) conveniently found out about last chapter, is actually real?!?”
As far as the characters go, they are never really given any sort of personality because all these big internal conflicts they are supposed to have are either just ignored or really have no consequences on their actions. Every (male) character in this book ends up seeming like the same middle-aged, slightly-round, partially-balding dude. I would have loved to see Tamas have to deal with losing his powers for longer than a chapter, or for Taniel to have to deal more directly with his fiance’s infidelity. Even Adamat, whose family is being held hostage, still ends up doing the exact same thing he was doing before they got held hostage and it all just works out in the end without him having to really make a choice.
And the magic system… truly a travesty. It had so much potential: traditional wizards vs modern gunpowder mages, set in an industrializing world. Instead, the magic system was just one big MacGuffin:
- Despite mentioning “knacks” many times, only a couple characters had these little magical talents and only when it was convenient to the plot.
- The wizards were just a bunch of promiscuous toadies, useful only for being murdered in order to show how strong other characters are.
- I couldn’t actually figure out what the gunpowder mages could do, short of snorting
cocainegunpowder to improve their eyesite. Sometimes they seem to be able to fire bullets out of the air, sometimes the decide that they need to use a rifle. Sometimes they can control a bullet after it is shot but it takes a lot of work. Some of them can blow up gunpowder at various distances away.
This was not a good book. The bones were there, but jenga-ed into a precarious tower that toppled in chapter 2. The reviews are so frighteningly good it makes me wonder whether I have lost touch with the genre, or my sanity.
A couple other tidbits I highlighted but couldn’t work into my review:
He fell without a sound, blood spraying across the inside of the carriage. The popping sound of air rifles was followed by the shouts of ambushed soldiers. A bullet ripped through the carriage over Tamas’s head. A horse screamed. He struggled toward the door.
“Oh no sir,” Olem said, grabbing his coat.
Bo rubbed his temples. “I’ve had my third eye open all day. She’s hiding herself well, and pit, it’s tough to pick out individuals beneath that shield. I’ve seen her well of power manifest twice now … Bitche is driving cattle now. I just saw it again, right now. It’s her, all right … she’s barely bothering to hide.”