"Be careful, Syron. There are more dangerous things than gods."
-big text on the back cover-
In the early 2000s, I used to play a lot of World of Warcraft. My Dad had a private server, and I spent a lot of time in Teldrassil. The night elves had a cool aesthetic, and I always thought the guy ones were hot. Younger me would have probably become obsessed with this book.
The story has a Narnia-esque premise where the 20-something year old Syron is transported into a world resembling 1910s Europe inhabited by night elves. The book calls them sahiit, but they're night elves.
Despite the silly description I've given it, the world is unique and immersive. I was drawn into it and I found myself asking a lot of questions about the logistics of how the world worked that I don't usually ask in fiction. The fact that I cared enough to wonder is a sign that the book really sucked me in. Like in the video game Morrowind, these dark elves have a civilization with city planning that doesn't resemble the default. Also like in Morrowind, a lot of the answers for the questions I wondered are not answered. This is book one though, and it follows people hiding from mainstream Sahiit society. Its possible that in the next books we will see more of the world. For example, people in this world have access to pocket watches, radios, and sometimes electricity but there are no roads between settlements. There isn't a train either. As far as I can tell everyone walks, uses a horse, or uses magic because it is a rural society that doesn't have mass production as far as I can tell. That isn't a criticism. This world is presented in a way where all of these weird sounding details seem natural and obvious.
Imaginative is another word other reviews have used to describe this book. The main character is saved by a group of rebels in a similar situation to Sonic and his friends in the comic book. Unlike the video game character, these rebels are plagued by the kind of mean girl politics actual activist groups are plagued by. The main character is an "angel" meaning that she has the potential to fight the "God" who rules this society. Immediately her presence causes the rebels to covertly break into three factions. One sees her as a way to fight the God, the common sense option. Another sees her as exactly the leverage the rebels need to surrender and protect themselves from genocide. The third faction views her as a threat to their power because they benefit from the hopeless situation. In another book this would have seemed frustrating, but instead it just felt real to me.
The protagonist is believable and the best part of the book. She is honest, gains confidence throughout the course of the book, too trusting, and pure despite the hardships she goes through. Throughout the entire book I found myself caring more about what would happen to her as opposed to what would happen to the world that she was in. She is captivating, and a little inadequate in the way that you or I would be if we were dropped into the Syrian civil war. She has agency, and in the end of the book its her actions which bring them to the conclusion.
I saw another review that said the beginning of the book was hard to follow, but I really disagree. The beginning of the book was hard to read, but that's only because of the content. There is a very hard depiction of a scary boyfriend, and it felt like the introduction to a horror book to me. While sexual assault isn't actually depicted in this book, the threat of rape is very much present in this book, but only at the start. It was in my opinion the best part of the book.
I won't go into it, but the ending made me sad. It was bitter sweet, and I've always been dissapointed in that kind of ending. The second book doesn't exist yet, but I'll buy it when it comes out.
