Kingdoms of Death
Ratings72
Average rating4.5
The fourth novel of the galaxy-spanning Sun Eater series merges the best of space opera and epic fantasy, as Hadrian Marlowe continues down a path that can only end in fire. Hadrian Marlowe is trapped. For nearly a century, he has been a guest of the Emperor, forced into the role of advisor, a prisoner of his own legend. But the war is changing. Mankind is losing. The Cielcin are spilling into human space from the fringes, picking their targets with cunning precision. The Great Prince Syriani Dorayaica is uniting their clans, forging them into an army and threat the likes of which mankind has never seen. And the Empire stands alone. Now the Emperor has no choice but to give Hadrian Marlowe—once his favorite knight—one more impossible task: journey across the galaxy to the Lothrian Commonwealth and convince them to join the war. But not all is as it seems, and Hadrian’s journey will take him far beyond the Empire, beyond the Commonwealth, impossibly deep behind enemy lines.
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6 primary books14 released books#4 in The Sun Eater
The Sun Eater is a 14-book series with 6 released primary works first released in 1950 with contributions by Christopher Ruocchio, L.J. Hachmeister, and R.R. Virdi.
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Kingdoms of Death continues Sun Eater's streak of being absolutely bananas. This whole book is pretty depressing and is not going to be a happy read. There is also a shorter section and a longer section in the middle I found pretty boring at the time but the things they lead to are very important, so I forgave that. The stuff that everyone talks about in this book is so emotional and well written; Sun Eater has not made me emotional before this, but I was fighting tears for the entire last chunk of this book. It's not so much what is happening, but how it is being written about. I was put through the ringer and exhausted after marathoning the second half of this book in a night.
I will say a legitimate criticism I have of this book is just the overwhelming amount of fake language stuff in it. The previous books all had some of this and it never bothered me. But large portions of dialogue in this book are written in a made up language and then immediately translated to the reader. Just...say Hadrian translated it, and leave me out of this.
9/10
Rating a middle book of a series is always hard. The Sun Eater/Sollan Empire series is a 5 star series, with great characters, incredible worldbuilding, and just all around coolness. A less than perfect book 4 from a really good writer is no reason not to pick up the series. Furthermore, this is not the book that Mr. Ruocchio actually wrote: it's the first half of a far more epic work that was split at the last minute due to paper shortages.
This probably accounts for the problems in pacing that somewhat bog this book down. A bogged down Sun Eater book is still pretty damned exciting, but the middle of this one was tough to get through. I found myself not really wanting to pick it up, which wasn't entirely the book's fault. I was just finding reading in general pretty difficult.
I may reread it some time, to see if it comes off differently. Perhaps some day this and Ashes of Man will be released in a single volume as intended. Still not bad, just not as exciting as the others. I repeat, not a reason to quit reading Sun Eater; not a reason to not get started.
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