Reviews with content warning for Murder - Reforged

Reviews tagging 'Murder'

lightoferebus's review

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adventurous emotional hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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mrshays's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Gary Furlong's narration was wonderfully immersive. I thought the narrative took a little while to pick up, but the back half of the book was very engaging.

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wildflowersnwhiskey's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

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robin_reads's review

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

King x his Prime fantasy with a bit of murder and mystery! What else could one want. More romance than plot, which I usually don’t like all that much but it wasn’t too much for me.
This was a lovely read. Very enjoyable. The pacing was just right and the characters were lovely. No notes.

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crufts's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

In a classical-fantasy setting, Balen, an up-and-coming paladin, is appointed as the Prime bodyguard of young King Zavrius. It's a huge honour - although since they used to date, Balen is somewhat distracted from his duties.
But there's no time to think about that. With Zavrius's four siblings murdered in suspicious circumstances, the people are turning against their new ruler. Can Balen protect the king and do his duty to his country, or will Zavrius's reign be over before it starts?

I read the novel via the audiobook, so please excuse any misspelled names in this review. Further comments about the audiobook behind this tag:

The audio quality was good and clear, with crisp enunciation from the narrator.
However, he has an odd, sultry tone of voice which subtracts from the clarity of his reading. Very innocent lines like "Balen went stiff" (referring to his posture) land differently in this tone of voice.
When it came to reading out Zavrius's flirty double-intendres, the narrator absolutely nails it and I can't imagine anyone doing it better. The problem is that he has a tinge of this sultry Zavrius voice going all the time.
However, by the end of the book the narrator's tone has become neutral, without the sultry tone. This is much better and allows the dramatic ending of the story to land as intended.

There was a lot I enjoyed about the novel.

Firstly, great choice of title. "Reforged" is both a literal statement of what happens to certain artefacts during the novel, and a figurative comment on the protagonists' relationship.

In general, the worldbuilding felt believable and authoritative. The setup of the different countries and their cultures was well-established and made sense.

I particularly liked how the paladin order was centred around the gedrocks, a long-deceased mythical creature whose bones and ichor are ritualistically used to empower the paladins. It worked well as an explanation of how the order could rise to power, yet now faced the risk of dying out.

As far as characters went, Balen was alright. But Zavrius was fascinating. The contrast of his languid playboy facade with his deeper secretive nature, always wearing a social mask, made him a memorable and brilliant character. His abilities (which somewhat resemble a D&D School of Glamour Bard) were also an intriguing match for the role of king, in comparison to his militaristic and combat-trained siblings.

The inclusion of the comic characters

Mallet and Lance

was also a great choice as their presence balances Balen's seriousness. Having them appear so soon after the gory fight in the

forest

also allowed them to act as a tone balancer that prevented the story from getting too grimdark.

Plot events and scenes were interesting and well-designed, with a good balance of tense and lighthearted scenes.

I also really liked the overall concept of the novel, that of

a new kind of prince (pacifistic and flamboyant) who is suddenly shoved into the position of king and must stand for his values, no matter what

On the downside, there was just too much description (of places, objects, and people) being given before it was needed. These paragraphs dragged on and slowed the pace of the novel.

Similarly, I found myself annoyed by the obvious statements made in the prose. These statements add nothing to the novel and cutting them would boost the pacing. These were things like:

> But [Character] had to disagree with that. "It's not the right decision," he said.
It's obvious that he's disagreeing based on his dialogue line. You don't have to tell us the same thing in the narration.
> [Character] was offended by the rude remark, perhaps because of her relation to the matter. "You're being very impolite," she snapped.
It's obvious from her dialogue that she was offended. There's no need to tell us.
> [Character] said "[dialogue]". It was unclear if he was reacting to [past event A] or [past event B].
Of course it's unclear. You don't have to explain this to us in the narration, we already know this.

There were also some sentences that repeated the same word very closely together, e.g. the word "slightly" appearing in two adjacent sentences.

Similarly, there were sentences where character names were repeated unnecessarily when they were already the subject. Like

(paraphrased) "Balen jabbed his sword and struck the other man. Balen slid sideways and feinted" (rather than using "he" in the second sentence)

. This gave me the impression that sentences had been cut and moved around without being reread for flow.

It also bothered me that the themes and character development were not tied into the outcome of certain critical scenes.

Consider climactic battles such as Balen vs Thenlyss, Balen vs Alick or Zavrius vs Theo. If Balen had been told at the start of the story that Thenlyss and Alick were traitors and faced each of them off in a duel, nothing would have been different. Balen would have defeated the two of them all the same, because he beat them simply by being a better fighter. So what does it matter if he wins?
Similarly, before the story begins, Zavrius had already defeated his entire family in battle, Theo included. It's not like he needed to change or grow in order to be strong enough to defeat them again. So what does it matter if he beats Theo at the end? We already knew he could do it.

This lack of integration with the themes and character development made the outcome of these scenes feel arbitrary and less meaningful.

There was also one plot point which broke my suspension of disbelief:

After being suspected for the murder of FIVE royals, why the hell were the Rezwyn representatives invited to the Prime ceremony?
Just imagine if this happened in real life - say, the simultaneous assassination of Princess Diana, Prince Charles, Prince William, Princess Royal Anne, and Earl of Wessex Edward. The suspected enemy state would have been instantly banned and embargoed, no matter how much they denied the murders. Leaders across the kingdom would be calling for immediate declarations of war!
I just don't believe that the Rezwyns would be allowed anywhere in Uslef, let alone up close with the new King where they could assassinate him. The same objection applies for all other scenes where the Rezwyns were invited to Dynasty events.

Similarly, I found it odd that in scenes like the coronation ceremony, that nobody was calling the Rezwyns "savages", "bloodthirsty", etc for their supposed slaughtering spree. The attendees' comments were weirdly tolerant of these supposed murders, instead mildly saying things like "Oh, well, you know, they have that weird religion..."

Finally, about the names: One thing I noticed in another review was a complaint that names like "Zavrius" were too weird. But I disagree. His vaguely Greek-sounding naming theme was pretty consistent over the entire family (Theo, Arasne, Petra, etc).

Wow! That's so much complaining, right?? But I'm nitpicking these issues because the "bones" of the novel are terrific and have great potential. I thought it was a very interesting concept, and I want it to be even better. The good news is that this is the author's debut novel, and he's recently published a sequel (Reborn) which we can look forward to.

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mallorypen's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

I really wanted to like this book more - there was so much promise in the world building, and in the relationships between the paladin/king, king/siblings, nation/nation. But the overall pacing really drained away from the experience - in several instances throughout the narrative, I would find myself feeling bored despite an arguably action-packed scene. Additionally, I couldn’t quite parse out what story the author was trying to tell: individual scenes felt fully fleshed out and pointed in a particular direction, but there wasn’t a strong through-line that connected them all together in a cohesive story arc.

For example:

Zav and Bailen traveling alone together right after the initial attack felt like it positioned Bailen as a cocky hotshot who just had his certainty taken away, and Zav as a young Royal who wanted to be anything but a king. Then, scoot forward to the plot against Zav’s life at the ball - Zav was more concerned about the political implications of keeping peace than being worried about the weight of his crown, and Bailen was shown as a deeply insecure character who had struggled with doubts of his own worth and value.

Those ideas aren’t impossible to connect, but the way they were written made them feel dissonant instead.

Lance and Mallet - fantastic characters. I did find their arc a little dissatisfying, given that there was an opportunity for a training montage that ultimately didn’t even come up again.

The ambassador - this could have been touched on more vibrantly in the second half of the story,

but once she leaves, the impact of Bailen and Zav saving her life/working towards peace/deifying rulers into gods was NEVER brought up again.

Alec and Lester - I was never convinced about Bailen’s love for either of these characters. I think I was meant to see Alec as a brother who was jealous of Bailen’s promotion but ultimately On His Side, but

Alec’s betrayal and death didn’t really surprise me or pack an emotional punch like it was meant to. And honestly, I didn’t feel like Lester NOT being a traitor delivered on the relief and joy angle either.

In a word: underwhelming.

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