Synopsis
The monarch wants him dead. A dragon’s torching the realm. Is his heroic gig about to be a critical catastrophe? Gorm Ingerson knows the king is a fink. With the land’s insidious ruler hell-bent on his destruction, the axe-wielding Dwarf berserker is desperate to beat him to the punch. But when he discovers the rotten regent’s claim of a town razed by the world’s richest dragon is false, the gruff adventurer fears there’s more than a personal grudge at stake. Struggling to convince his old comrades that they need to help him solve the mystery, the dwarven idealist stumbles into a sinister smuggling ring. And with strange creatures, cunning assassins, and vindictive bankers all plotting his demise, Gorm worries this time the price of doing the right thing will be fatally high. Can he make a saving throw against death with a high-stakes roll at disadvantage?
Dragonfired is the thrilling conclusion in the Dark Profit Saga satirical fantasy trilogy.
Review
The final book in the Dark Profit series is just as engrossing and fun as the previous books and I’m genuinely sad it’s over. Like the second book, this is a pretty lengthy tome, and takes the story scope even further as the characters deal with a big problem… a dragon-sized one.
In Dragonfired, our scattered heroes have to come together to expose a conspiracy while battling the systemic inequalities built into the world of the story. The premise is that bankers and corporations control a D&D style setting where heroes loot treasure from monsters and investors take bets on that loot before it even hits the banks. The resulting social commentary examined through a fantasy lens is done so with clever humour that comes as close to Pratchett as any other author I’ve read.
As before, the characters are at the heart of this story, and there’s just the right balance between humour and emotional depth that makes you care deeply for the characters’ fates. The plot is a bit more disparate than the pervious books as the characters are initially separated, but the writing is still engaging and everything comes together in the final act as we get the answers we’ve been waiting for regarding certain characters’ backstories – and about the world as a whole.
I was very impressed at how the author juggles so many storylines while maintaining the thematic consistency throughout the story that ensures it never loses focus even with the substantial page count. The surprises and reveals were brilliantly done, and the very clever way that things come together in the final “quest” and the subsequent fallout is genius.
This is one hell of a series finale, and cements this series as one of the strongest indie fantasy trilogies I’ve read. I’m sad it’s over, but I’d love to read more books set in this world, because it seems like a place full of endless corners to be explored and stories to be told.
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