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deanna's review against another edition
4.0
Tears blurred in her eyes until it seemed that she looked at her once-familiar world through a pane of warped, melting glass. The lyrium dust and Archdemon's blood dragged her down like a thousand pound of steel chain. The churbling purrs and occasional snaps of griffons at rest filled her ears as she climbed into the tower that they'd claimed as their own, and Isseya didn't know whether she wanted to glory in the sound or mourn its impending loss.
[...] The Blight takes too much from us.
But it was impossible to refuse. How could she? This was the very purpose of their lives. Every time they went out to the field, the griffons and their riders willingly courted death. They fought the darkspawn with all their hearts, and risked oblivion freely, so that others might survive the horrors of the Blight. The Grey Wardens had already made the same sacrifice that she was asking of the griffons. Was this really so different?
Like previous Dragon Age tie-in novels, Last Flight establishes an important plotline of the installment of the game it precedes. In this case, it was foreshadowing the disappearances of Grey Wardens for Dragon Age: Inquisition. Valya and other mages from the Hossberg Circle of Magi, seek shelter by joining the Grey Wardens after the outbreak of the Mage-Templar War. They are welcome with opened arms and quickly put to work pouring over centuries old documents looking for accounts of wardens acting strangely and abandoning their posts as well as references to darkspawn acting more intelligently. However, this plot point is not the main focus of the book. Valya finds the journal of Grey Warden Isseya and slowly uncovers the truth of the griffons' extinction and shows just how far the Wardens are willing to go to end the blights.
The story is told both from Valya's POV in the present and Isseya's POV in the past though it's much more heavily focused on Isseya, which I enjoyed because I found her the more interesting character. There also isn't a love story subplot in the installment of the series, which is maybe unusual for a video game series so well known for providing an abundance of opportunities for the player character to romance other characters, but I found that a nice change of pace from the previous novels.
It might be worth noting that, unlike Dragon Age previous authors, Liane Merciel is not affiliated with Bioware in any way. I have no way of knowing just how much of this story is Merciel's own and how much of it was outline for her by other writers at Bioware, but I really enjoy the end result. Merciel's writing is lyrical and emotional and it's obvious that she's knowledgeable on the basics of the game lore (though I'm still wondering if the details of the Joining are truly common knowledge throughout Thedas as she claims through Valya or if Dragon Age: Origins just misled me into assuming that). I hope to read more of her work soon.
voidslantern's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
fluka's review against another edition
3.0
This was decent! Probably strictly of interest to fans of the Dragon Age series, it expands on the existing background lore of the series in some interesting ways and has interesting implications for the future. The characters aren't particularly deep, but are sketched well enough in their own minimalist way. The plot moves forward at perhaps even too quick a pace, with lots of jumps forward in time, so that one never gets particularly invested in one particular story strand, except perhaps for the central relationships between the griffons and their riders. Nothing earth-shattering, but if you're a fan of the games I can think of worse ways to spend a few days.
eclectasy's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
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
beanut's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
hollykyte's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
2.5
sagareads's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
heyjaycee's review against another edition
5.0
It’s ten years after the end of the Fifth Blight. After the destruction of the Chantry at Kirkwall and the subsequent slaughter of the city’s Circle mages, war has erupted between mages and templars across Thedas. Mages who want to fight are massing at Andoral’s Reach. But others, seeking only safety from the templars who would destroy them, make their way through the desolate Anderfels to Weisshaupt, home of the Grey Wardens.
Among them is Valya, a young city elf and mage from Hossberg. On reaching Weisshaupt and sanctuary, she and her fellow mages are put to work in the library, looking for any information they can find about intelligent darkspawn, though they’re not told why. But, during her research, Valya discovers a hidden diary belonging to another elven mage: Isseya, a Grey Warden from the time of the Fourth Blight, and sister to the famed hero Garahel who ended that Blight by killing the Archdemon.
Merciel weaves Isseya’s headlong, years-spanning tale of horror and heroism during the Blight around Valya’s quieter story of discovering herself, safe at last inside the walls of Weisshaupt. And in the end, what Valya finds in Isseya’s diary will change not only her own fate but that of all Thedas.
The Grey Warden order has always been the apotheosis of Dragon Age’s dark fantasy theme. In Last Flight the boundaries between good and evil are crossed and crossed again, becoming blurred beyond recognition, by a Grey Warden order that is the world’s only hope of salvation in the face of apocalypse. Nothing is simple, nothing is clear. And even so, even as Isseya transgresses, even as things go from bad to worse, she’s brilliant. She shines. You can’t fail to love her, to inhabit her, to catch your breath when she performs some death-defying stunt or comes up with a world-saving idea.
Merciel’s story really shines when it comes to the griffons. Merciel clearly knows her animals, and that comes through in the depiction of the blood and the grace of a working human-animal partnership in time of war.
I cried more than once at this book. Be warned: there are detailed—not gratuitous, but detailed—descriptions of animal suffering and death within these pages.
Ultimately Last Flight made me cry and gasp, broke and mended my heart, and left me breathless as I put it down for the last time—just like the Dragon Age games always did. To me, this is the best of the Dragon Age tie-in novels. I’m glad I left it 'til last.
Among them is Valya, a young city elf and mage from Hossberg. On reaching Weisshaupt and sanctuary, she and her fellow mages are put to work in the library, looking for any information they can find about intelligent darkspawn, though they’re not told why. But, during her research, Valya discovers a hidden diary belonging to another elven mage: Isseya, a Grey Warden from the time of the Fourth Blight, and sister to the famed hero Garahel who ended that Blight by killing the Archdemon.
Merciel weaves Isseya’s headlong, years-spanning tale of horror and heroism during the Blight around Valya’s quieter story of discovering herself, safe at last inside the walls of Weisshaupt. And in the end, what Valya finds in Isseya’s diary will change not only her own fate but that of all Thedas.
The Grey Warden order has always been the apotheosis of Dragon Age’s dark fantasy theme. In Last Flight the boundaries between good and evil are crossed and crossed again, becoming blurred beyond recognition, by a Grey Warden order that is the world’s only hope of salvation in the face of apocalypse. Nothing is simple, nothing is clear. And even so, even as Isseya transgresses, even as things go from bad to worse, she’s brilliant. She shines. You can’t fail to love her, to inhabit her, to catch your breath when she performs some death-defying stunt or comes up with a world-saving idea.
Merciel’s story really shines when it comes to the griffons. Merciel clearly knows her animals, and that comes through in the depiction of the blood and the grace of a working human-animal partnership in time of war.
I cried more than once at this book. Be warned: there are detailed—not gratuitous, but detailed—descriptions of animal suffering and death within these pages.
Ultimately Last Flight made me cry and gasp, broke and mended my heart, and left me breathless as I put it down for the last time—just like the Dragon Age games always did. To me, this is the best of the Dragon Age tie-in novels. I’m glad I left it 'til last.