The Pyres

Sword and Sorcery, Book 3

By: Dylan Doose

Narrated by: Mike Carnes

Monsters. Magic. Epic battles. The mountains and valleys of Romaria echo with the calamitous sounds of civil war. A New Order challenges old gods, and on the festival night of the Pyres, the tides of destruction are fully unleashed.

When the great white city of Brasov turns black with ash, when the sky goes red and the moon hangs like a dark void above, who will stand against the darkness?

A twisted tale of three unlikely heroes. Heretic monk turned sorcerer Aldous Weaver. Infamous crusader turned fugitive Kendrick the Cold. Aristocrat, rogue, monster hunter, and legend in his own mind Theron Ward. Three men condemned to die for their crimes find in each other both the will and the means to survive. A dark brotherhood with sword and sorcery is forged, and all monsters meek and mighty do fear the three.

©2016 Dylan Doose (P)2024 Dylan Doose

A Solid Grim Dark Fantasy

Although this is the third book in the series, this story picks up shortly after the events of the first book, Fire And Sword (available on Kindle Unlimited, so I recommend you read that first). The World-building is GrimDark and occasionally more course that I liked, but over all does a fair job navigating sensibilities (although some of the more grotesque/sensational details were a tad off putting). The setting is centered upon a powerful church/religion in a struggle against the corruption dark sorcery (so naturally all magic is condemned). That makes life for at least one of the protagonist a bit dicey, since he is a fire mage and former church monk. The other two are a disgraced crusader (with an iron fist) and a one-eyed rogue that provide the muscle for the teams purported monster hunting activity.

And that is where this story begins … right in the middle of a war between gods (The Luminescent) and demons (Dammar) and their avatars, The Patriarch and the Dog Eater. But this is a dark story, so the good guys have a dark secret and the bad guys seem to have a legitimate bone to pick (they just do it with monsters) … so we get our three (3) antiheroes to walk the line between. And The Pyres … the fires that burn sinners and pagans every “First Day” festival. After each chapter we also get an interlude that provides flash backs, out of sequence dialog and fortune cookie wisdom from some dude's diary/prophesy that may or may not have any direct impact on the evolving storyline. You do get a few surprises along the way … just to keep you motivated to continue. Ultimately it is the narration that saves what is otherwise a fairly typically fantasy.

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

#ThePyres #SwordAndSorcery #FreeAudiobookCodes #KindleUnlimited

Great Series

I was given this book for free,

I enjoyed the book, and the narration was great as well.
Will have to read the rest of the series for sure.

Worth a listen for sure.

Unique Story n Style

The Pyres is an unusual story and structure. At times it was difficult to follow character relationships and storyline. Although, some of that could be me as I often multi-task when listening to audiobooks. The author is encouraged to keep writing new tales because his style is interesting, if a bit too unique. The performance was well done with lots of creative enthusiasm.

Vivid story and great performance

The story is really well written. It has lots of depth and is vividly descriptive, leaving little doubt as to what exactly is happening. As typical with audio books, when the narrative jumps backwards to past events, it can be confusing. This might better be served with descriptive chapter titles, this set of three books definitely kept me riveted and wanting to hear what happens next. The performance is one of the best I have heard and definitely enhanced my enjoyment as the plot unfolded.

Don't eat while you listen seriously.

This is a real sword and sorcery book, a lot going on and a lot of gore, seriously don't eat while listening. Overall it was a good book and a really good series. Narration was great,
I was given this free review copy audio book at my request and have voluntarily left this review