Short Book Review // A Time of Blood by John Gwynne

A Time of Blood is the second book of Of Blood and Bone trilogy by John Gwynne. In a nutshell, A Time of Blood is an action-packed work of dark/epic fantasy, set in the Banished Lands, where the eternal war between Ben-Elim, divine creatures come to flesh, and their demonic foes, the Kadoshim, rages, affecting everyone in the world. It is a multi-POV story, an individual voice given to a variety of characters, best suited for adult readers, I think, as it's fraught with violence. Although I don't know whether it's written as adult fantasy. It has a young adult fantasy vibe to it, which, together with the overall (grim)darkness of the book, is confusing. For more information about the book, visit the author's website.

A Time of Blood continues straight where the first book, A Time of Dread, ended. It introduces a new main character and, through her, presents the point of view of the adversary of those who stand for the Ben-Elim. That's something I didn't expect, as the first book was written solely from the POV of those standing against the Kadoshim, and is the main reason why I devoured the book despite the few flaws that otherwise might've made me give up on it.

Things I find off-putting in A Time of Blood are smallish, yet I found the first of them especially frustrating: repetition. There's a LOT of returning to the events in the first book and repeating the facts about the characters and their pasts. About two-thirds of the book is plagued by rehearsing the same things over and over again. It's the second book in a series, so a certain amount of reminding the reader about the key points and previous events is necessary, but in A Time of Blood, it reaches the point where it makes you wonder whether the author is repeating the past events merely to add bulk to the story. 

Another feature in the story that I don't like is a few too many miraculous escapes from impossible situations. If this type of fantasy was right up my alley, I probably wouldn't pay any attention to it, but I must admit that the trilogy isn't quite my horn of mead. It's a bit too action-heavy for me, and the writer side of me seethes with frustration at seeing how much richer and more multifaceted this series could be if the author had put down the sword and axe every now and then, giving more room to the other levels of the story. However, I enjoyed A Time of Blood, and I'm already a hundred pages in A Time of Courage, the last book in the trilogy.

The underlying theme that no one is purely good or evil, and even the most horrid of deeds are done because the person behind them believes they're acting for the greater good, speaks to me. It also happens to be one of the themes I focus on in my books, which is why it makes me hail Of Blood and Bone that much louder.

All in all, A Time of Blood is a good read. It kept me encaged from start to finish, even managed to make me feel slightly sick at times. If it were purely adult fantasy, not adult fantasy written so that it doesn't need to be age-restricted, I'd say it's a great book.