The Faithful and the Fallen Series by John Gwynne

Book review of an adult epic fantasy with action, adventure, politics, and strange creatures.

This series revived my love for classic epic fantasies.

Malice, Valour, Ruin, and Wrath are the 4 books in this incredible fantasy series, and each one holds a special place in my heart. As I write this, I’ll attempt to write coherent sentences but be warned I cried and finished this series just last night, and have yet to recover. However, I will refrain from describing the plot of the later books since I don’t want to spoil where the story will go!

What is this series about?

Corban, Nathair, Evnis, and Veradis are the 4 characters highlighted in the first book. While there are also amazing side characters such as Cywen and Kastell, the entire series includes chapters from the point-of-view of 10+ characters. So I’ll stick to the main 4 :) In the beginning of Malice, Corban is a young boy 13y/o boy with a dream of joining the soldiers of the King of Ardan. He’s surrounded by his amazing parents, Gwenith and Thannon, his sister, Cywen, his best friend, Dath, and his grumpy stable master, Gar. Nathair is the prince of Tenebral and is just jumping at the chance to help his father in the politics of ruling a nation. Evnis is living a double life after selling his soul to an evil creature beyond their world of flesh and bone. Finally, Veradis is a young man from Ripa travelling to Jerolin, the capital of Tenebral, to meet the King, and work in his warband to get experience in combat. As the book progresses, alarming symbols appear all over the Banished lands, symbols prophesized to mark the beginning of the God-War. To thwart the enemy, known as Asroth and his black sun, the Kings of the Banished Lands converge to create an alliance to protect their kingdoms.

Shortly afterwards, shit hits the fucking fan.

Betrayal, murder, conspiracies, secret organization, foul magic, giants, creatures no man should ever come face-to-face with, and a whole lot of grief are some of the pieces that make up just the first book, Malice. It might start at a slow pace, but trust me when I tell you that by the 4th book, you will look back to the beginning and WISH UPON A FUCKING STAR for some of that peace :( The slow beginning is the very embodiment of the calm before the storm.

What did I like about this series?

1. Tropes

So while there are typical fantasy tropes like prophecies and chosen ones, John Gwynne expertly shows why those tropes became classics. Instead of using them as substitutes for creativity, he unleashes their full power to give readers the creme de la crop of chair-gripping classic adventure fantasy.

2. The Worldbuilding

While the first chapters may be slow, they also go through the daily lives of the characters, and show the culture, geography, and customs of different nations within the Banished Lands. The world itself is pretty easy to get accustomed to since it is a typical medieval-inspired fantasy world but the thoughtful descriptions of the land and the buildings bring to life important details you’ll be happy to remember when the story gets chaotic and gory.

3. The characters

The good characters are so lovable but reasonably flawed and the bad characters are fucking vile and hateful. The distinction between good and bad people is repeatedly challenged and questioned throughout the series and some switch over to the dark side or light side. The individual character arcs woven in the tapestry that is this magnificent work of literature are balanced, and realistic, and some just warm my fucking heart :)) Over the series, the band of people around the protagonist grows to such a diverse and lovable group of different personalities and creatures, I’TS ADORABLE!!!! Every single one of them owns a place in my heart.

4. The emotions

My heart ached during this series. So many that I came to LOVE, died brutally and the horrors of war are not muted, whatsoever, in these books. Book 3, Ruin, ironically ruined me the most. Keep 911 on speed dial because you will get a few heart attacks and you might just get an aneurysm.

What I felt could have been improved is the writing, but that’s a given since Malice is the debut novel of this author. The writing is just not bad enough to give any of these books less than 5 stars though ;)