Gift of Griffins is the direct followup to last year’s terrific Halls of Law. The action in Gift picks up right where Halls leaves off, and the two books as a whole feel like one single story that was just too long to fit into a single volume. So the author committed duology.

Gift makes no sense whatsoever without Halls. Consider yourself warned.

The story told in the two, however, is a lot of fun. This is epic fantasy that plays with some of the standard tropes in neat twisty ways.

Our point of view character is Kerida Nast. Ker was planning to be a soldier, like pretty much all of the women and men in her family before her. Two of her older sisters have risen to high rank in the Faraman military, and Ker expects to follow in their bootsteps.

So from the very beginning, the story feels like a heroine’s journey rather than a hero’s journey. One of the truly neat things about the story is the way that it turns out that Ker Nast is not the heroine whose journey fulfills the epic prophesy and saves the day.

Ker is only a piece, admittedly a big piece, of the prophecy that kicks the invaders out of the Faraman Peninsula and brings the mythic griffins back to their long abandoned home.

As we discover in Gift of Griffins, all of the various magics used by the human population of this world were literally gifted to them by the griffins centuries if no millennia ago. But humans being human, pretty much the first thing those magic users did was band into tribes based on exactly which kinds of magic they used in exactly what way. Then they bickered amongst themselves until, humans being human again, wars broke out, different groups gained ascendancy, and then ruthlessly tried to wipe out whichever faction was sucking hind tit.

Humans do kind of suck sometimes. The griffins, taking the very (very, very) long view, are none too happy with the way that their gift is being abused.

So when Ker finds their stronghold, courtesy of her friend Wiemark – a very, very young griffin that she found and “woke” in the griffins old ancestral home – the griffins tell her to solve her own problems and refuse to let Wiemark go back with her to help her.

Ker has a lot of problems to solve. Her homeland has been invaded by the forces of the Sky Emperor of Halia across the ocean, along with their mages. The Halians believe that women are chattel, and therefore maraud through Faraman killing every woman they see who does not immediately obey their every command – as well as all the women in the military because of course women bearing arms is absolute anathema.

They also kill every single Faraman mage (called Talents) that they find. Because Faraman magic is also utterly corrupt – because they believe it is used by women to deceive and enslave men.

(Any commentary on any contemporary groups, issues or problems feels intentional to this reader. Your mileage may vary.)

Ker, along with the friends and allies that she has gathered along her journey, has to figure out a way to defeat a force of magic users who specialize in mind control – and are all too proficient at it.

But she has an unexpected ally – in the middle of the enemy stronghold. If she can be rescued. If they can join forces. If Faraman can be saved. If the prophecy can be brought to fruition.

The odds are long, the stakes are high – and not everything is quite the way it seems.

Great fun.

Escape Rating B+: On the one hand, it is very nice indeed to have an epic fantasy that seems to be complete in merely two books – and only a year apart at that. On the other hand, the ending felt a bit rushed. It seemed like Ker was still getting her allies lined up when the villains essentially delivered themselves into her waiting (and fully armored) arms.

Not that I wasn’t perfectly happy to see more-or-less good triumph and for definitely evil to get its just desserts – but it felt like 1.9 books of build up and only .1 books of resolution. It felt like the ending happened awfully fast. I wasn’t ready and it didn’t feel like they were, either.

Again, not that they are supposed to be so fully ready that the final battle turns out to be a cakewalk – but they didn’t feel quite ready enough.

On my third hand (so, I’m an alien – or Kali the Destroyer. Sue me if you dare! BWAHAHAHAHA) and not that Ker and her allies couldn’t have used Kali’s power, one of the things I really liked about Gift of Griffins was the discover that while Ker is part of the prophecy, she is not the usual “prophesied one” or “chosen one” who is supposed to save the day. And that the “chosen one” in this story was also a woman and not the boy king – a character who does exist in this story and does help but is also just part of the prophecy and not its culmination.

The characters, well, the ones on the side of the angels at least, are all interesting and Ker in particular is a lot of fun to follow. One of the things that also makes this story work, at least for me, is that Ker’s side, while it is manifestly better than the villains, is never claimed to be perfect. Ker’s people have certainly done their share of murder and suppression, just not on the grand and horrific scale that the Halians are engaging in.

That the Halians turn out to not be the cookie-cutter villains they first appear to be makes the story just that much more involving.

That Ker is working to restore a system that may very well separate her from the man she loves, because it is a better system overall for everyone else, is a big and interesting part of her internal conflict – and we like her because of it. We want her to both help save the day and find a way to keep her own personal happiness.

She’s earned it.

I got to 30% and DNF, the writing wasn't for me. I was a little lost since it was the second book in the series. because I am a mood reading I felt it was just me, I think! its hard, I will definitely try it again at some point.

A Gift of Griffins by V. M. Escalada

Pros: fun characters, interesting magic systems

Cons: ending felt rushed

It’s been roughly six months since the invading Halians conquered the Faraman Polity. Jerek Brightwing, hiding in the Serpents Teeth mountains, has been proclaimed Luqs by the Faro of Bears and her soldiers, and is desperate for aid. He sends Talent Karida Nast and a small group to contact nearby potential allies who can help them fulfill the prophecy and retake the throne. Meanwhile the Halian Princess Imperial travels to Farama the Capital for her arranged marriage with the new mage controlled Luqs, Jarek’s father.

This is the second book in the Faraman Polity duology. This series has a lot of fun characters. Kerida and Tel’s relationship was great. I enjoyed seeing Kerida meet up with her sisters, family reunions complicated by Kerida’s being a Talent and therefore ‘not of the world’.

There are three groups of magic users (four if you count the griffins). The Talents and Feelers are all Gifted, with a single innate ability. Talents can ‘flash’ people and objects to see the truth of them. Feelers are varied, with some being able to speak telepathically across distances, healing, lifting objects, etc. The third human group are the Halian Shekayrin who use red faceted crystals to perform spells. Kerida starts out as a Talent but through a Griffin gains an extra power. I thought the author did an excellent job of showing her slowly learn how to use and then master her new abilities. Her progression felt earned even though she mastered things quickly.

I would have loved to learn more about the griffins, especially their history with the Gifted. Considering the prophecy and the reverence griffins are held in by the Shekayrin it seemed an unfortunate oversight to not give more background about them.

I thought there was another book in the series so I was very surprised when things suddenly wrapped up at the end of this book. While there was a good climactic fight that made for a great novel ending, I was surprised by how little series wrap up there seemed to be. More on this in the spoiler section below.

Ultimately it was a good book though I’d have loved a third volume that went into the difficulties of returning society to what it was and dealt with more of the social aspects the first book introduced.

***SPOILERS***

The more I thought about the ending, the more questions I had about how things would continue after the final page. There’s so much work left to be done and a lot of questions left unanswered. Similarly, it didn’t feel like the prophecy was properly fulfilled. Yes, a small group of Feelers, Talents, and one Shekayrin did come together, but I have trouble believing that other Talents and Shekayrin would follow suit considering their long held belief systems. The majority of people in the Faraman Polity don’t even know Feelers still exist, and given how Feelers have been demonized and mythologized over the years, I suspect there will be a measure of panic once non-gifted people learn Feelers are real. Also ignored are the male soldiers and citizens of the Polity who accepted Halian rule without coersion, something that the first book dealt with really well but was largely ignored in this one.

The second edition to Escalada was very good, it built well upon the first book, while still building up speed. I do have to say though that in parts the book seemed dragged out and Kerida tended to talk about Auras a lot, it was mentioned almost every time her character had page time, after a time I just started to skim those sections, but over all the book was very good. Escalada introduced more depth to varying characters but also introduced new ones who helped add to the quality of the narrative.