Asher Wismer

This is an ambitious dark fantasy tale with some SciFi elements settled in the distant future.

Around 1000 years ago, the Earth suffered a cataclysm from the sun that increased in size. Half of the world's population perished and three distant cities were built in gigantic glass domes. For unknown reasons, the world outside of the domes is partially inhabitable but the cities no longer have trade, knowledge of science and languages lost and the world is dominated by humanoid hybrid animals.

The first chapter is a teaser of sorts. A human named Machine Lobe has just arrived to a small enclave inhabited by pureblood raptorkind only to find everyone is afflicted by a horrid plague. They are ruled by a wicked raptoress that invented a medicine that merely keeps the disease at bay without truly curing anyone. Machine Lobe offers his help to cure everyone with a mysterious magical box that creates a lifesaving medicine of nearly any infectious affliction...

The story suddenly shifts and we meet Cloth, a human-raptor hybrid that save for her wings and odd teeth looks fully human. She is a high ranking soldier from Farspan, the city ruled by hybrids in the north. After being assaulted by humans in a small village and forced to kill them, she decides to team up with a middleage man named Kush that doesn't harbor ill feelings towards her.

Confused about his motives, she grudgingly accepts his friendship and they travel together to her city to meet The Talon. Kush discovers that Farspan is a prosperous city but humans are enslaved. The Talon orders Cloth to first visit Ageria, the human controlled city of the south to attempt a peace treaty and along the way, attempt to visit the wild wastelands of the West to locate a machine that could anihillate their city.

Accompanying them are two hybrids: Kel a disgruntled middle age raptor that dislikes human equally after being imprisoned during the human civil war in Aegeria, Saegram another raptor that seems more accepting of Kush's company but who carries an emotional burden of his own and two human slaves. Along the way, the group accepts the company of a 4th hybrid raptor named Free who is a good willed albeit emotionally immature wanderer who sees Cloth as an older sister figure and Kush as a friend (with implied benefits).

Attempting to keep the ruse of a peace treaty in order to visit the ancient libraries of Aegeria and locate any clues, the group encounters horrid perils in the townships on the way, different opinions about the origin of the hybridkind, slavery, cannibalism, bandits and eventually reach a strange city that remained isolated from the rest of the world in the West that follows a strange cult...

The book heralds interesting and flawed characters with hidden agendas and you wonder if Kush and Free are in reality spies. Machine Lobe makes a second brief appearance in the middle of the story albeit we aren't fully sure of his allegiance. Cloth seems like an odd protagonist with a sort of strange chip on her shoulder but who remains loyal to The Talon's plans...

A surprising dark and riveting story, some chapters are really great and yet the story seemed somewhat disjointed, particularly to the strange finale. Despite the odd flow of the story, it was a rather good read with tons of unanswered questions that will hopefully be answered with a sequel someday.… (mehr)