Title: City Stained Red
Author: Sam Sykes
Date Finished: 8/24/2017
Notes/Opinion:
This was my beach book. It probably should not have been. I originally discovered this book through the author who I discovered from an article on a Twitter conversation that he had with another author. (https://twitter.com/samsykesswears/status/890751932779839488?lang=en Read the whole thread, it’s hilarious.) In the conversation, he talks to Chuck Wendig, the other author, about his new job as a camp counselor. And, of course, this being a summer camp people start dying. Anyway, that got me interested in both authors so I followed them on twitter. Sykes mentioned that if I didn’t buy his book he would haunt me in my dreams. I like my dreams so I decided to buy his book.
City Stained Red stars a rather large cast of characters that I will list:
Lenk-Human protagonist of the story. I want to slap him hard.
Kataria- A shict (think elves). Dating/sleeping with Lenk. I have mixed feelings on her.
Asper-A human priestess/healer. Has a curse on one arm that kills people. Quite possibly my favorite character.
Gariath-A dragonman. The muscle of the group and enjoys ripping people to shreds. Is way too introspective especially near the end of the book.
Dreadaeleon-A wizard. Very much a 17-year old boy with the attitude to prove it. My third favorite character.
Denaos-Thief/guy who watches everyone/ far too knowledgeable about things he should not be knowledgeable about. Ties with Asper for my favorite character.
A very, very short summary of this book is that Lenk goes on a midlife crisis and takes his friends with him. A longer summary is that Lenk is tired of adventuring and wants to get the money owed to him by Miron Evenhands, whose been avoiding paying for a while, so that he can settle down and start a farm or something. (One of Lenk’s characteristics is that he does not think things through. This comes back to bite him on the ass, repeatedly.) They track Evenhands to Cier’Djaal, a city in the desert, and accidentally end up starting a civil war.
The book switches between the characters (always when it starts to get interesting/cliffhanger of course) throughout the novel. My favorite mini-arcs are Denaos’, Asper’s, and Dreadaeleon’s simply because they’re the most interesting. Sam Sykes is a horrible tease with the ending though. Luckily, there’s a sequel which I will be getting once I have money again.
Advertisements Share this:
