The Vessel

There’s a secret in Abernay Forest, one that allows Doctor Taur to create miraculous cures. When his talents reach the king’s ears, he is called to the castle, where he meets Prince Oswin and is asked to perform an impossible procedure. As he struggles to decide what to do, the castle is attacked and the king slaughtered. The prince, now in danger, sneaks Taur out and they flee.

Meanwhile, an orphaned girl named Luna spies interlopers in Abernay Forest excavating an ancient entombed creature—the source for Taur’s cures. Aware that the creature harbors a dangerous otherworlder, Luna tries to halt the excavation. But it’s too late. The wraithlike otherworlder goes free…and enters Luna, taking over her body.

Fugitives Taur and Oswin must find her before she releases a deadly plague from another world.

©2025 W.K. Greyling (P)2026 W.K. Greyling

Adventure

The Vessel by W. K. Greyling is a great adventure fantasy. David Hill did a great job with the narration. The story is entertaining, enjoyable, action, adventure, interesting, and more.

I received a free copy of this book and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Good Overall

The beginning was a bit slow and the pace only picked up slightly, but overall this was still a solid listen with a complete storyline. While it wasn’t my personal favorite from this author and didn’t grab me the same way a previous story did, I can definitely see others enjoying it more than I did.

overall

It did start a little slow but overall I liked the story. As the story progressed I got more into the story and was curious to see where it was going.

Great story!

I've listened to, I think, 3 audiobooks by this author now and she does an amazing job each time. She's creative in a way that I can't say/remember having read or listened to any other stories about her characters and what they have to go through. I like that she can go back and forth between genres and isn't "stuck" doing just one. I can't wait for the next one.

My only real issue with the narrator was how he'd overpronounce certain words. I found that annoying.

Truly original speculative fiction

I listened to this on my drive to work. Every time I arrived at work or at home, I wanted to hear the next bit. This was my third WK Greyling book. Her imagination shines through, relentlessly original in the big plot ideas, reliably confident in writing the details. The vocal performance is polished and enjoyable. A few odd mispronunciations, but a very satisfying production.

The overall idea is a story of a flawed hero and a conflicted heroine, stumbling from making a living, to surviving the attention of power, to just surviving, to saving a good slice of the world. If you are used to thinking of fantasy literature as "yet another rehash of the monomyth", this is not it. You WILL be surprised, just as I was.

Without giving away any details, there is a rich vein of contemporary themes here. Exclusion, persecution, infectious diseases, dysphoria, privilege, world-ending catastrophe, encountering something truly alien... it's all here. And there is courage, duty, love-in-spite-of-everything, compassion, lifting up those who have stumbled. Most well-written stories entertain, and have one big message - "The Vessel" entertains, AND has several.

Yes, there are some things a reader might wish to have been written differently. Some characters jump to conclusions that the reader has already drawn, but would likely be a stretch for the characters. Some things feel a bit modern (but then, this is a novel for a modern audience, using a pseudo-historical setting as a means, not an end). If you are familiar with dagger/knife fighting, some scenes might make you try to visualise how exactly a thing happened.

None of that distracts from the depth and strength of the character development. By the end, you will be cheering for the three protagonists, because each of them has overcome adversity, proved their character, and has something to look forward to.

And I am looking forward to the sequel.