TL;DR Review: Epic, addicting, complex, and action-packed. A spectacular new entry into what is arguably the best progression fantasy series around.
Synopsis:
Scorio has won his vengeance. His foes lie vanquished, his skeptics silenced.
Yet, as the powers of hell watch eagerly, Scorio and Naomi spurn those who would recruit them, and venture into the untold depths of hell in search of the enigmatic Herdsmen. Amidst landscapes of haunting beauty and terror, they will face terrible fiends, forge friendships with wondrous new allies, and encounter societies of Great Souls to put the worst of hell to shame.
All will seek to manipulate Scorio. To use him. To bend him to their will.
And all will suffer the consequences for trying.
Full Review:
Stepping back into the world of Bastion, the pit of Hell, and the Great Souls in the opening pages of LastRock, it felt like I never left.
From the beginning, the dynamic duo of Scorio the Red Lister and Naomi the Nightmare Lady are instantly addictive. Their drive for advancement, their growing relationship, and the battles into which they are drawn are just impossible to put down. This book is long—and I mean LOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNGGGGGG—but I burned through it in record time because I was utterly spellbound by the stakes, the world, the plot, and most of all, the characters
The Characters:
At its core, the Great Souls series’ greatest strength has always been in its characters.
On the surface, Scorio is pretty much exactly what you’d expect from a progression fantasy protagonist: driven, ambitious, overall a “good” human being, flawed in all the right ways, and most of all, strong. But with every new discovery and revelation, we get to see the complexity beneath, the layers that make him perhaps the most nuanced character of any progression fantasy series I’ve read. His advancement and progress is made all the more interesting because of who he is; we want to learn more about him and how he’s become to be the way he is, and so we are more than willing to go along with the wild ride.
Naomi continues to solidify herself as the greatest female progression fantasy protagonist. The fact that she is the Nightmare Lady means she is an amazing asset to Scorio in battle, and brings a fascinating depth to her character. She’s cynical, suspicious to near paranoia, and jaded by hard experience. But her effort to overcome that is a major element of her progression, one that inevitably leads to fascinating places. And knowing that within her is quite literally a creature of nightmare gives some amazing room for plot twists and turns that had my jaw on the floor.
Leonis, Lianshi, Moira, Ravenna, Jova Spike, and a host of other familiar faces are back, but we’re treated to a whole gamut of fun and engaging new characters—from the half-mad Plassus to Alain, eternally condemned by his power to be a Peeping Tom (in a way that’s both creepy and funny), from the Iron Tyrant to Queen Xandera. With every new character, the series becomes ever more complex and engaging—chiefly because you never really know who is an ally and who is secretly an enemy.
And, of course, the powers on display by each character is incredibly fascinating. The scope of imagination required to craft such disparate and unique abilities—multiplied a hundred times over with the full cast of dramatis personae—is immense. A true testament to the author’s skill and creativity.
The Story:
Where Bastion was more focused on Scorio and Naomi alone and The Rascor Plains just began to expand the world outside of the city of Bastion, LastRock rips the world wide open and gives us our first big-picture look at hell. We learn more about the many layers that descend into the Pit, the power players who are seeking to carve out their own territories and domains—both the Great Souls and True Fiends—and we get a first-hand look at the real powers at play.
The action in LastRock is truly breathtaking. There are entire chunks just dedicated to bloody, massive-scale battles with thousands of fiends. Which, inevitably, leads to deaths among those Scorio has come to call friends. The true brutality of this hellscape is displayed fully for the first time, and the stakes become all too clear when even souls ranked far higher than Scorio and Naomi face death—real death, from which there may be no return.
The book instills a very real sense that “no one is safe”—and, more importantly, “nothing is off-limits”. The impossible happens time and again (in a way that makes it feel all too real) and the characters’ journey is utterly unpredictable in the best possible ways.
Final Thoughts:
Bastion has always been the most epic and ambitious of the progression fantasy series I’ve read, and LastRock just cements that in my mind.
The story gets bigger, the stakes get higher, the characters grow more powerful, and the personal issues become ever more troublesome.
With this being the most enthralling of an already insanely addictive series, I am now eagerly waiting to find out what secrets will be revealed and what enemies will arise to challenge Scorio and company in Great Souls #4. The next book CANNOT come soon enough!
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