Collecting And Reading

Malice (Book 1: Faithful and the Fallen)
Author: John Gwynne

Malice is one of the best fantasy books I’ve read in a long time.

Utterly captivating from beginning to end. Action packed, lore fuelled, and exhilarating.

Giants. Warriors. Magic. Beasts. Gods. Demons. War. You know, all the good stuff.

Weirdly, and I don’t know if this will make sense to anyone but me. But this felt like dad fantasy. Like I could imagine my dad reading and loving this book. It seems like something a dad would always say “oh yeah I loved that Malice by John whatshisname”. I don’t mean that in a bad way, it just gives me the feeling of everything I was recommended and grew up on in the fantasy film/book genre as a kid from my dad has somehow bled into this story.

I cannot believe that was John Gwynne’s debut. It felt like I was reading someone who has been writing fantasy for decades. His prose was gritty, yet at times aesthetically idyllic.

Gwynne’s writing style is so fluid, and often with multi POV books like this, especially when you have such short chapters, it can feel a drag. But nope. Every character was well woven, the good guys and the bad guys. And everybody in between.

At first I was concerned at the number of characters and trying to remember who was who. That lasted all of half an hour until I found my rhythm and everything so easily slotted into place.

I truly felt immersed (at times a horrifically dangerous thought) in this world and I cannot wait to dive back into Faithful and the Fallen.

If the remainder of the series can maintain this level of quality I will be promoting Mr Gwynne to my auto buy author list.

5.0/5.0