Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.
SYNOPSIS
Sworn by Oath
Kagen Vale is the trusted and feared captain of the palace guard, charged with protection the royal children of the Silver Empire. But one night, Kagen is drugged and the entire imperial family is killed, leaving the empire in ruins.
Abandoned by the Gods
Haunted and broken, Kagen is abandoned by his gods and damned forever. He becomes a wanderer, trying to take down as many of this enemies as possible while plotting to assassinate the usurper–the deadly Witch-king of Hakkia. While all around him magic–long banished from the world—returns in strange and terrifying ways.
Fueled by Rage
To find the royal children and exact his vengeance, Kagen must venture into strange lands, battle bizarre and terrifying creatures, and gather allies for a suicide mission into the heart of the Witch-king’s empire.
Kings and gods will fear him.
DNFing at 22%.
This book is literally badly written info-dump after info-dump, followed by some gratuitous violence and detailed sex scenes. The info-dumps are bad. Like really bad. Every single character I’ve met at 22% of the way into the book basically speaks in info-dumps. I’ve heard there’s detailed rape scenes as well, but at 22% into the book I haven’t seen one. And to be honest? I don’t want to see one. No, thank you.
Now, the violence and the sex scenes by themselves wouldn’t bother me, but when you follow one with the other, and include mentions of dead children while your characters are having sex, well, its not for me. Not every book is for me, I know that, but just don’t with this one.
Kagen the Damned comes out May 10, 2022.
Preorder at your local indie bookstore, or at the following links:
Birdie's Book Nook 
Yeah. This one was definitely rough. There really was so much info dumping, and I lost count of the number of people who got raped to death. Some of the later characters were interesting, and the world building did get a bit more interesting. I’m not sure it was enough to make this one worth it to most people, though.
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Raped to DEATH? Oh jeez, I’m glad I didn’t keep reading. I didn’t need to read that.
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Yep. TO DEATH. And some of them were kids/young teens. Thankfully most of them weren’t described in explicit detail, but it was still uncomfortable to read.
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Yeah, I’m good without having that in my brain forever. Oof.
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