For centuries, the vast Ironship Trading Syndicate relied on drake blood—and the extraordinary powers it confers to those known as the Blood-blessed—to fuel and protect its empire. But when the drake blood lines began to fail, a perilous expedition was mounted to secure them.
Claydon Torcreek survived the fraught mission through uncharted lands in pursuit of a myth that might have secured his people’s future. Instead he found a nightmare. The legendary White Drake was awoken from a millennia-long slumber, with a thirst to reduce the world of men to ashes, and the power to compel an army of Spoiled slaves to do it.
Spurred on by a vision he desperately hopes he can trust, Clay and rebel naval officer Corrick Hilemore hijack a warship and head towards the icy southern seas, searching for an ancient secret that may give them and their allies a fighting chance.
They are aided on another front by Blood-blessed agent Lizanne Lethridge. The spy and assassin will use her diplomatic status to infiltrate deep into enemy territory on a quest for a device to save them all.
As the world burns around them, and the fires of revolution are ignited, these few Blood-blessed are the last hope for all of civilisation.
So I’m doing the thing! I said in my review for THE WAKING FIRE that I wanted to get through THE DRACONIS MEMORIA before starting Anthony Ryan’s new book, A TIDE OF BLACK STEEL (which will have been recently released by the time I post this), and so I’ve finished THE LEGION OF FLAME & I’m about four hours into the audiobook for THE EMPIRE OF ASHES.
I’m trying to get this review written quickly…if you follow along with my reviews, you’ll know I always talk about wanting to read series/trilogies really quickly and then never actually do it. I’m realizing now the danger in actually doing that is having the story all run together in my head (more than it would ordinarily), so hoping to get this finished up before making much more progress in THE EMPIRE OF ASHES.
Anyway!
Things pick up not long after the events of book one, and we continue on with Clay, Lizanne, and Hilemore as the POV characters. Additionally, we get a new POV in this one, Sirus. The White dragon is amassing an army of dragons & Spoiled, and war is imminent. Through Sirius’s POV, we get extremely up close and personal with the White & get a sense of how malignant it is.
One of my main gripes with THE LEGION OF FLAME was the lack of Tekela. I grew to love the relationship between Lizanne & Tekela in THE WAKING FIRE, but Lizanne is off on a very different mission here, and is mostly separated from Tekela (I’m happy to report Tekela is front & center again in THE EMPIRE OF ASHES)
That said, Lizanne’s story is probably the most unique & compelling of the POVs here, as she is putting her espionage skills to good use, and infiltrating the Corvantine prison-city of Scorazin. It’s like a small world-within-a-world vibe, a functioning city, with its own set of rules, its own politics & culture, but still…very much a prison. Lizanne is following some clues to try and track down the Mad Artisan, someone she believes can help in the coming war. Even if maybe he’s been dead for a super long time? Hmm.
Meanwhile, Clay & Hilemore are on the literal other side of the world, chasing after things Clay saw after drinking the White’s blood. They discover something of a Lost World, one that may unlock a lot of secrets about their own world. There is, of course, some completely bonkers dragon action scenes here, which Ryan writes so well.
I read the overwhelming majority of this book on audio (and I think I’m planning to read 100% of THE EMPIRE OF ASHES on audio), and there was a change of narrator from book one to book two. Steve West takes over for Steven Brand for the last two books of the trilogy, which is odd. He’s a great narrator, don’t get me wrong! I really enjoyed his performance a lot (and I know he’s a really well-regarded audiobook narrator), but Steven Brand is like THE narrator for Anthony Ryan’s books, so I’m just curious why there was this change for the second and third book of this trilogy. But again, West’s narration is outstanding, so no knocks against him.
This was awesome, I’m digging this trilogy so damn much! There’s a huge element of arctic exploration in this one, as Ryan continues to incorporate wildly different locales in these books. One chapter you are lurking in a gnarly subterranean prison city, the next you are on the open sea, and then you find yourself facing off with bloodthirsty drakes in the jungle.
The spirit of adventure is really alive in these books & I’m having a lot of fun with them! Excited to see how things wrap up with THE EMPIRE OF ASHES. Anthony Ryan continues to be one of my very favorite fantasy authors!
Grimdark Dad 