Thank you to Orbit Books and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The City of Dusk by Tara Sim is an adult fantasy novel that will transport you into new world of magic and gods. The story revolves around Angelica, Risha, Nikolas, and Taesia, the four heirs of powerful houses who each want to gain more power and possibly become the new emperor. The heirs are all friends though, and open to working together. When someone they know is accused of murder, they must join together their disparate gods-given powers and influences in order to find out who the true murderer is.

Here is a magical and ominous excerpt from the Prologue:

"“How many more?” the boy asked. His voice was faint and slurred, the half mumbling of a dreamer.
Do not fret, answered the Voice. It curled around him the way it always did, soothing his thoughts, his rising trepidation. It won’t be much longer. They do not yet know, but they will soon. Then...it will be time.
"Memories of paint faded, until all was calm and hazy again. His gaze traveled east, to the flat, dark land beyond. Where the others were waiting.
Not much longer now, cooed the Voice, a smile in its words.
The boy smiled, too. Turning to the dead body behind him, he grabbed an ankle and continued to drag it east."

Overall, The City of Dusk is a magical novel that will appeal to fans of Crescent City, All of Us Villains, or the Obsidian and Blood series. It reminded me of Crescent City, because the author transports us to a new world where magic is an inherent part of the system, and magic is seen as normal. It reminded of All of Us Villains, because it is an ensemble cast featuring the heirs of several powerful houses. It reminded me of the Obsidian and Blood series, because there it is also part fantasy and part murder mystery. These were some of my favorite books in the past two years, and I am happy to say that I enjoyed The City of Dusk just as much.

One highlight of this book are the four main characters. I'm not usually a fan of books with large casts, but I found the four characters easy to tell apart and each solid in their own right. Each of them have a back-story, motivations, and powers, and I rooted for all of them. I especially liked the chapters from Taesia's and Angelica's points of views. Another highlight of this book is the mystery aspect. When I read the synopsis, I thought this would be a standard fantasy adventure. Adding in a murder mystery definitely elevated this book and made it even more enjoyable for me. If you're intrigued by the excerpt, or if you're a fan of adult fantasy books in general, I highly recommend that you check out this book when it comes out in March!

Thank you NetGalley and Orbit books for an early copy of this book! I am choosing to leave this review.

Vengeful gods and defiant chosen ones form an alliance to keep their kingdom from a large scale war. Each heir has their own reason for the alliance. The Four Realms—Life, Death, Light, and Darkness each with a defiant heir.

PROS
- Taesia Lastrider
- Noble houses with magic abilities - an absolute yes
- m/m, f/m, f/f relationships
- Cassandra Clare vibes but gay (ish)


CONS - Taesia Lastrider can do no wrong and no con applies to her *chefs kiss*
- the 60%-86% mark did not hit the same as the rest of the book
- there were some themes in the book that were not seamlessly incorporate so it felt like sometimes a thing just happened because the author needed to finally do something with a character they introduced in the first 100 pages of the book. -which made one of the big wow moments was honestly just annoying

The City of Dusk was overall a good time. The story could be a little generic with many run-of-the-mill fantasy elements and almost too much going on at times, but nevertheless it’s well-written and has an enjoyable, diverse cast.

The premise is an interesting one. There’s multiple magic systems, multiple otherworldly realms, and multiple scheming gods. There’s competing noble families and clandestine rebel groups and mysteries to be solved. Naturally all these factors eventually overlap and converge leading to an explosive finale.

In this world there are four realms ruled by different gods that once could be easily traversed by their native peoples. It wasn’t until an event known as the “Sealing” occurred 500 years ago that access between all the realms became completely blocked and those currently within a realm permanently stuck there. The story takes place in one realm, Vitae, which is slowly dying as a result of the Sealing and the actions of a group performing an illegal magic called conjugation in the city of Nexus.

The city is ruled by the Holy King Ferdinand who is closely watching the heirs of four rival noble houses to choose among them a successor. Each noble house has one of the four gods for an ancestor causing each bloodline to have inherited distinct magical powers. But despite their rivalry for the throne and their differences, the current heirs of each house attempt to work together to undo the Sealing that is slowly destroying their realm.

The main characters are almost all heirs from the competing houses. Taesia from House Lastrider is the rebel “spare” heir who has always been happy to aid her older brother in his duties but would prefer life free of noble responsibilities herself. Angelica from House Mardova is ambitious and frustrated – craving the power of the throne but struggling in the use of her elemental powers. Nikolas from House Cyr is an unhappy soldier who lives in the shadow of his favored younger brother’s death and his father’s contempt. Risha from House Vakara is a dutiful necromancer who has more interest in her work than her impending arranged marriage. Lastly, there is Julian who alone among them isn’t a noble heir but a beast hunter with unusual powers.

Some amongst this mixed bunch are friends and some are decidedly antagonistic, but inevitably the core five find each other bound by their impossible task, if not godly ties. Frequently they are torn between choosing to work together and choosing to keep some of their many secrets from one another.

The strongest part of the book is definitely the characters. With the multiple POV chapters it can be a challenge to make sure every character feels distinct from one another but I never found that to be an issue here. The character-work was much more fleshed out to me than the worldbuilding which could be elaborate in some places but sparse in others.

Unfortunately, the only downside is that some relationship dynamics felt only superficially explored – especially those between main characters and supporting characters. One of the hazards of a large cast and an expansive plot is the lack of page time to develop certain dynamics, and this author seems to take the “I’m going to tell you that this character now feels [blank] about another character” even though there’s very little textual build up to make me find this believable. It’s a bit of a turnoff to me, especially since I have the feeling some of these minor characters were introduced as love interests but due to their poor development it’s hard to root for them.

On the other hand, the relationships that always rang true to me were those between each heir with their families and the dynamics between the heirs themselves. The sibling scenes between Dante, Taesia and Brailee were always excellent – and I loved all the moments between Risha and her sister Saya, Nikolas with his mother, and even Angelica’s grudging ones with her stepmother Miko. But the scenes with Taesia, Angelica, Risha and Nikolas together were consistently most loaded of all and I’m surprised we didn’t get to see more of their group and individual interactions. These are the characters we get to know the most, so it’s their relationships I would have expected to get more exploration.

As for the pacing, I found that sometimes events could be a little meandering and slow-going, but there were several twists that I never saw coming that kept me on my toes. And the last 10% of this book? That’s what I call an ending with a bang. I read through the final events of this book faster than I did the rest of the novel because the action and intensity were definitely taken up a notch in a great way.

I’m looking forward to see what the next installment has in store.

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit Books for providing the free eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Orbit and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

The minute I opened this book, I was hooked. The City of Dusk is full of political intrigue, has a unique magic system, and vengeful Gods. These are great ingredients for a story, but there were some aspects that fell short for me.

Tara Sim’s writing is incredibly vivid and I loved it! I felt fully immersed in the story, with a clear vision of what was happening because of how she was able to connect her words. She effectively built a world that captured my attention and made me all the more intrigued by what might happen. The four different houses, the four Gods, and the four heirs to each house were all very well crafted. The characters themselves had depth and were easy to follow and align with.

My biggest issue with this book is that it felt like it dragged unnecessarily. There were moments that felt unnecessary to the overall storyline and could have been held out. This did not completely ruin my reading experience, but it did drag out the experience longer than it could have been. There were a few times I contemplated DNFing, only because it was taking so long to get through it, but then the book would speed up and remind me why I was enjoying it. I’m also not sure I agree that this is a “dark adult fantasy.” It felt much more YA to me.

I am glad I stuck it out and finished The City of Dusk. It’s an incredibly intriguing plot with political intrigue that had me hooked. I’m keeping my eye out for the second book and while it's not at the top of my TBR list, I do plan to read it when it releases.

My Rating: 3.5/5

Within the first few pages of The City of Dusk, I knew it was going to be something great. Now that I’m sitting here having just finished it a couple of minutes ago, I am just struck by how monumentally incredible this book was. It is an epic of such monstrous proportions with so many perfect moving parts that I commend Tara Sim in executing each of their roles so well. I am so overwhelmed by how much I loved this book that it’s hard to construct the words needed to express all it left me feeling in this review. But I will try.

Characters. Sim has created some unforgettable characters, each of which I have found something to love about. We have Risha, the kind straight-laced necromancer who loves her friends despite the barriers of duty that separate them. Angelica, the fiery elementalist with a chip on her shoulder who wants nothing more than to prove herself worthy. Nik, the gentle warrior who feels less than enough even though his heart shines as bright as the blood in his veins. And Taesia. Taesia, Taesia, Taesia. I love this brave, selfish, witty, impulsive shadow-wielder most of all. She doesn’t take any BS and will go to great lengths to protect those near and dear to her. She walks such a morally-grey thin line and I loved seeing her sway back and forth across it. While the story focuses on these four, there are SO many other characters that nestle into your heart. It’s evident how much work Sim put into them, giving them lives and purposes of their own.

Magic. There are four gods in this world and four noble houses that gain powers from them. I don’t want to delve too deep into what those powers are because I had a lot of fun discovering them as I read and I think you should too. But I will give you a preview. Elements. Light. Shadows. Death. Aside from those four, there’s also the existence of a fifth type of rogue magic called Conjuration. People don’t really know exactly how it works but nobody is allowed to figure it out as it is now outlawed. That doesn’t mean some won’t try…

Worldbuilding. Again, it’s really hard to describe everything without revealing spoilers. Sim did an EXCELLENT job of creating this world and there are A LOT of details packed into this book. However, while it is dense, it never felt like an info-dump of useless lore. Everything she created played a part in either the story or in bringing the world alive. I won’t get too far into the details but in essence, the world is divided into four realms and each god belongs to one of them. The story takes place in one of those realms but the other three heavily come into play as the story progresses. I’ll be completely honest and say that some of it took a while to sink in and it was sometimes hard to keep track of what everything meant, but by the end I had a pretty good grasp of the world and its significance.

Political Intrigue. I freakin LOVE a good story with some political intrigue. GoT and The Folk of Air are some of my favorite books and The City of Dusk is now within their ranks because I love a book where we can be at court and observe characters having to traverse a world full of people with their own agendas. I’d say aside from the worldbuilding, this is the area of the book that had so many moving parts. I usually latch on to a story and try to guess what people’s motives are and what the outcome will be but it was so hard to do that here because so much was happening and I LOVED IT. I love a book that surprises me and The City of Dusk did just that throughout its entirety. In a world where four heirs are competing for a spot on the throne, how could it not? There’s no shortage of alliances, conflicting loyalties, and betrayals.

Adventure. How so much can happen within one city is astounding. The City of Dusk is an epic for sure, but it didn’t need to travel to far away lands to achieve that. There’s murder, death, corruption, secret magic, violence, battles, friendship, and more in this book, all of which plunge our characters into all kinds of crazy paths and revelations. I was engaged throughout this whole book but the last 10% of it had me dizzy and close to a heart-attack with everything that happened.

Representation. The representation in this book both culturally and LGBTQ+wise was so diverse and inclusive. Sim didn’t go too deep into making cultural parallels between this world and ours, but she definitely made it clear that the city was a melting pot with people from all kinds of lands and realms and I was so excited to find a few characters that would look like me in the real world.

Romance. Alright, I included this section because I know my romance peeps are out there and they want to know. Romance is present in this book but it is definitely a sub-plot. A few actually. The spice level was mild but in terms of violence and gore, this book was definitely adult so who knows? Maybe more spice will come in book 2. I’d say Sim is laying the groundwork for some potential couples to arise and one in particular has ALL OF MY ATTENTION. 👀

Read if you enjoy:
🔥Epic adventure
☀️Court Politics
🌑Gods and their magical descendants
💀Noble houses
🔥Strong friendships and familial bonds
☀️Demons
🌑Funny banter
💀Stellar writing

I wanted to check out this book because of the synopsis and I will say this was an interesting original fantasy story but many times it read more like a young adult story.

I did enjoy the multiple character POVs, the diverse representation was pretty good, the magic system, the dark atmosphere and the world building was amazing!

It was really hard to get through this book. The plot at times got repetitive, had a lack of continuity and the story just coasted until the end. This is a 3.5 star book. I would be interested in reading the sequel.

Thank you to Orbit Books and NetGalley for providing me with an arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Spoiler Free Review: 4.5/5 Stars

The City of Dusk was a fantastic read and I can’t wait to get myself a physical copy. If you like beautiful worlds, intricate magic, and morally grey characters then I highly suggest this book.

The story is a multi-POV fantasy about the heirs of four houses, each of them descended from a god. It took me the first four chapters to really grasp the world, but after that I was good to go. I’ll admit, there were a few times I still got a little lost, but with such an in-depth world as this one, I’m willing to figure it out as I go. I truly loved all of the characters, there was so much diversity and queer rep. The magic was familiar, but unique. Shadow and light magic as well as necromancy and the elements, but the way that each character used the magic and how it played into the shaping of the world itself was refreshingly new.

There were a few plot twists that I totally called from the very beginning (I jumped out of my chair and screamed “I knew it!” into my empty apartment at one point). There were also a couple that completely shocked me, which is my absolute favorite.

The City of Dusk comes out THIS TUESDAY, March 22nd. I absolutely cannot wait for the sequel because it was all set up so well.

DNF 20%

I'm not finding much to connect with here. The author has obviously put a lot of work into this world, but there's nowhere I feel like is a good place to grip. It reads more like YA than adult–the first ten percent of the books is introducing each character in a way that's not quite enough to care and too long before things feel like they move along. And that's my problem with the book on the whole, I think: there's nowhere to sink into this world between brief character moments and infodump. No matter how intricate or interesting the world is, without the characters leaping off the page to bring it all to life, I can't get there, because fantasy isn't my thing. I have to get there through the people.

I have really enjoyed other works by this author, but this one wasn't for me.

DNF at 50%

I'm so sad that I had to DNF this book, I wanted to like it so much. I've not read this authors YA books before and wanted to give her adult fantasy a try. This books read extremely YA, not adult. I read a lot of adult high fantasy and this was not that. The magic system and world building were really interesting but I felt like at 50%, nothing was making sense or clicking for me. I didn't get enough page time with each character before the chapter and POV was switching to someone else. I also feel like there were way too many POVs who have similar voices, that it was hard to distinguish the storylines. As an adult fantasy reader, I feel like the YA themes and writing style are what killed my interest. I may come back to this one once its published, but for now, I"m going to say, Tara Sim may be an author that just isn't for me.

Tara Sim has an absolutely incredible knack for world building. With gorgeous and immersive descriptions, you really do feel this world start to form around you. I struggled with the pacing as it can be rather long and dense especially in the first half which threatened to take me out of it, but I try to close one eye as it sets the stage for the rest of the trilogy and ultimately works out at the end.

Another thing that Tara Sim excels in - building characters. Some characters I did not particularly care about until the end, but there are 6 povs and each voice is distinct. Gorgeously diverse and casually queer.

I'll definitely be getting my hands on the next book as soon as possible.

- incredibly dense
- Really intense
- Not the best thing to read when you are stressed and sick (unless it becomes a comfort read over time etc etc)
- Politics! Magic! Everyone is queer!
- I do not read enough fantasy to deal with this
- Risha is my favorite for the record, thank you
- This is SO LONG

Four stars. I Do Recommend It.

Tara Sim, the author of The Timekeeper Trilogy, The Scavenge the Stars Duoloy, and several enchanting short stories, starts her adult debut with a city held in the sway of four influential houses.

Four gods. Four families. Life. Death. Shadows Light. But how can a city survive when the gods leave, causing their queer descendants to bicker and bargain over power? How far will they go to save the city from themselves? Tara Sim knows how to write a novel tailor-made for goths in a dense story full of politics, clashing characters, and an intense magic system (I <3 Taesia Lastrider 's shadows). It's easy to imagine how the towers pierce the sky, the incense at the temples, magic circles scribbled on the ground, certain people playing a child's game called Sacrifice.... The crossover appeal will also attract fans of YA, especially those who love epic fantasy worlds with detailed histories.

For me, what I loved while reading was the city's history. While immensely dense at times, there were moments when I felt more invested in the past of the Houses than in the actual characters. It was fascinating seeing the contradiction of their powers and magic used to be vs. what they are now. (Tara, A+ job with the demons.) I can't wait to see more of this pay off in the next novel.

This is a hefty novel meant more for seasoned fans of the genre. While this may not be for every reader, I have a feeling Tara Sim is playing a long game with the plot.

NetGalley provided an ARC. All opinions are my own.

I liked this one, but also didn’t. It is a weird dichotomy. Set in a world that has been cut off from other realms, it is slowly dying because a balance is needed between the realms. The main characters are the heirs (plus their siblings) of the four main houses that are connected to specific gods and have magical powers because of it. As issues continue because of the Sealing, they try to figure out how to break it. But the gods have different plans for the heirs, and there are other players on the board that could change everything. I honestly really like the characters in this. They were multidimensional and their relationships were interesting. What I didn’t really like is the plot. Or more so, the “twists” that kept getting thrown in. Like the main plot-line was interesting and flowed well. But then towards the end, it just seemed like other things got thrown on top to make things interesting, but for me it overshadowed what the plot had been working toward the whole book. I think I’ll pick up the next in the series, but it will be with some trepidation.

Series Info/Source: This is the first book in The Dark Gods series by Sim. I got an eGalley of this book through NetGalley to review.

Thoughts: This was incredibly well written and I thoroughly enjoyed the detailed descriptions, complex world-building, and intriguing magic here. This is truly a fantasy of epic proportions and I respect the effort that went into building this story.

This is the story of four potential heirs to the throne: Taesie (who can wield swords and shadows with equal deadliness), Angelica (who wields the elements), Nik (who wields light) and Risha (a necromancer who can control the dead). When things start to spin out of control they will need to decide if they will work together to stop the destruction or if they fight each other for a chance at power.

I am a huge Sim fan and this was my least favorite book by her so far; that’s not to say it was a bad book…I just didn’t like it as much as her other books. I felt like the first half was very slow and the characters weren't as engaging and personable as her characters usually are. There also weren't any touches of humor; this book takes itself very seriously. I still enjoyed this, it was just long and at points you really felt that length.

I think part of the pacing issue is caused by the large number of viewpoints we jump between; this made it tough to engage with any one character and drew out the storyline. I enjoyed all the viewpoints we read from, it just made things move slower and feel longer.

I never wanted to stop reading this because I love Sim's writing style; it flows beautifully and her descriptions are amazing. But, I did have some times where I had to put the book down and rub my eyes and sigh, thinking "Oh my goodness is this book ever going to end."

My Summary (4/5): Overall I liked this. It is a beautiful epic fantasy with really cool magic and excellent world-building...but...I didn't love it. I do plan on continuing the series and hope that the next book is a bit tighter and maybe has fewer POVs. I would recommend this if you are a fan of Sim’s writing style or if you enjoy epic fantasy with intriguing magic systems.

Oh boy is this book a W I L D ride. For the first 75%~ of it I was SURE this was a standalone novel and now I'm DYING for a sequel while recommending it to friends to buy because it's definitely worth every penny.

Overall, the book is written in third person, alternating perspectives between the four main different houses (families), representing four different gods. You have Taesia, Dante, and Brailee Lastrider which are descendants from Nyx, god of night/shadows. Next is Nikolas Cyr, descendant of Phos, god of day/light. Then there's Risha and Saya Vakara, descendants of Thanas, god of death, and lastly Angelica Mardova, descendant of Deia, goddess of the elements. Each have powers relating to their godly great-great-etc grandparent (i.e., Lastriders have powers over shadows, Nikolas has power over light, Risha can animate/de-animate/talk/etc. to the dead, Angelica can control the elements). Ultimately, all of the houses are fighting to be named heir to a kingdom in the earth realm, where they all live as the other realms have been cut off from each other (which is causing their realm to slowly die). While they're coming up on Godsnight (an event every 100 years where the barriers between realms are thinnest), there's been a group committing acts of conjuration, which has long been outlawed. Even though they're supposed to be enemies, the heirs of each house have grown up together and are, in many ways, friends but are beginning to grow apart because of their duties and inherent family rivalries for the crown. Anything more would spoil this book but just be aware: there's a lot of shit you don't see coming, a lot you do but don't care that you see it coming because it's pulled off in such a masterful way that makes it delightful to read (cliches aren't bad, and I'll die on that hill, authors just have to be good at them and this one is).

A lot of folks seem to have issues with the length, characters, and worldbuilding but I think they're baseless. Is this book long? Yes, and it takes a bit to get going (see potential cons), however once you get through the first part of it, the length makes sense. Some folks think that the characters/families are confusing which I think is expected which such a large cast but the cast is also necessary, playing particular roles and helping to flesh out other characters. This is also the first book in a series, so there's going to be pieces that look "half-done" or "weirdly set-up" that will make sense later when we have the whole story. Finally, the worldbuilding. Some folks are upset that there's some words (i.e., ghagra choli and salwar) are given, but a description isn't. I honestly don't think it's a good use of book space to explain a cultural garment - we don't explain what we mean when we write "princess gown" because western culture has demanded we know what it is. If you don't know what the garments are, you can google them.

Frankly, this book is the first in a series I'm very excited about. If I had to pick series similar, I'd say Leigh Bardugo's Grisha Verse or Kelley Armstrong's Age of Legends series, as they're all high fantasy and the Grisha Verse (particularly the latest books) have a similar political/dark tone to them. Frankly though, The City of Dusk is in its own league and hard to compare for all the right reasons.

Potential cons of the book
- Good LORD was this book L O N G. The first 25-35% (roughly part one) is slow, in my opinion (although I have been told this is normal for adult fantasy), and this is the longest book I've read in awhile. HOWEVER! I will say, the length of the book makes a lot of sense, particularly once you finish the part one. Part one is a lot of set up (the worldbuilding in this book is IMMACULATE) that's necessary and I don't think, overall, any of the length is needless (that is to say, it all has a purpose that comes to light later)

- Less romance than I went in expecting. I read exclusively queer books these days (and this is delightfully queer) however I was personally expecting more romance/romance to be a more forthright aspect of it but that honestly doesn't happen until maybe the last 20% (and even that is more setup than actual romance. This con is me purely being someone who loves love).

What this book does right
-Representation. It feels actually genuine and integral to the book, as opposed to it just being there to say "look I have non-white, non-het, non-abled-bodied, etc. people I'm so ~diverse~" Nah this is actually a) well done b) meaningful and c) real.

-Worldbuilding. I said it earlier but it really is SO well done. A problem with a lot of books, particularly ones that are set in a new universe or something that don't rely on the character being new to the universe, is that they spend too much time telling readers (particularly at the beginning of the book) how everything works, instead of letting information come naturally as description/thoughts as characters do things naturally because that's /just the way they're done/. This book does just that though which is part of what makes it so good.

-Action. Holy crap. the 100 or so pages will have you DYING for the next word. It's a wonderful mix of worldbuilding, character development, and just damn good writing that artfully paints a picture in your head that doesn't just feel realistic, but is.

-Character development. Another thing this author is ICONIC at. This book is third person, alternating perspective which is my personal favourite was of telling stories because you get to know the main cast so much better to fully understand their motivations in a way that they don't allow those around them to see. There are a lot of characters, so I'd recommend getting the physical book because there's a House breakdown at the beginning that I kept wishing I could easily flip to (I was reading on my kobo and thus couldn't) but again, after part one a lot of stuff just comes together and starts flowing perfectly and you're more caught up/involved in the story without having to flip back and forth of "who's family are they apart of again?" Long books like this always come with some confusion, and it's about how quickly can an author and reader address the confusion and how well do they address it.

Ok so, I gotta be honest y'all. This book is too long. It's a slog. And I'm a Brandon Sanderson fan.

The difference here is he's better with his word economy. What happens on the page matters and there's enough going on from page to page and chapter to chapter to keep you interested in 500+ pages of story.

The City of Dusk doesn't really do any of that. It's not a bad book, it just needed to be thinned down. This book was so long, I stopped being excited to read it. After reading, I wouldn't want to read anything else for the rest of the day. In print it hits around 570 pages if I remember right.

And it's the first in a series! That's too long! At least for the actual content in the chapters and scenes. Here's the thing. This book has a really great premise. A magic system that I think is interesting (not sure, I'll get to that later) and a big cast of characters. A lot of them are queer and there's no homophobia!!! After one of the last books I read had homophobia in it, I was worried but this, at least, was a breath of fresh air in that regard.

Now, it gave me Warhammer 40k vibes. Which I loved. The settings are dark, things are rough. It was great.

What isn't great is the characters are flat, description runs on too long and it's vague. There's a family of necromancers and they use string to bind spirits. We only ever got vague descriptions of how it worked, but with so many words that basically said nothing at all.

Here's the story setup. This world, Nexus, used to be connected to other realms. Other species/ races are now trapped there due to the Sealing. When the gods up and disconnected everything for some unknown reason. Now the realm is failing, dying and if they can't break the Sealing, who knows how long it'll last. It's up to a group of heirs who are early in adulthood to break it down.

Now, you might ask why it's up to them. Why don't those in power do something? Isn't' it a little unbelievable?

Nope. Those in power want to stay in power, not admitting anything is wrong and get richer while those below them suffer. It is the most realistic and grounding thing in the book.

This is marked at adult and the characters are in their early twenties. I appreciated that. I'm so tired of fantasy always being people in their forties. Adult fantasy has had no variety for so long and I want this author to do well to bring younger adults into it without them feeling like they absolutely have to read YA. Adult means adults of every age, not just people closer to midlife and up.

That said, I don't want to spend this review ragging on the book. I, unfortunately, can't see myself reading it again. It's just full of unimportant prose. And it takes so long to get going. No one should have to read a book on the promise of "oh but that last 20-30% really pick up" because that's a sign that there's a real pacing issue.

I give it three (3) stars. Hopefully the next book is more edited and really brought to heel. Just because it's adult fantasy and has a bigger word count doesn't mean we actually need all of the words possible. Especially when they don't say much.

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thanks to them and the publisher

The Cirt of Dusk was a very interesting debut to The Dark Gods series. The description sounded promising, but I found that it was too long, especially considering it’s only the first book. I believe that if it had been more concise, or even if some scenes were less extensive, I would’ve had the motivation to finish.

Taesia definitely comes out as the main character - even though it's multiple POV - but I am NOT made about that. She is 100% my favorite character and her character development - including her family relationship - was one of my favorite while reading. The City of Dusk has a wonderful and detailed world full of gods and magic. There was so much to love and uncover. While The City of Dusk might have a very typical "Book One" elements like a longer exposition to set up the world, an explosive last quarter to get ready for book two, I am so in love.

The City of Dusk balances a story about unlikely alliances with a plan to save the city. But nothing is ever as simple as it seems. This plan will test them in ways they never could have imagined and reveal things they never knew. It's a story that asks about rebellion and power. Once the action pieces really start to stack up, it becomes a race to the finish. Because it's multiple POV we are able to see all the pieces begin to come together which inspires intrigue and suspense.

Centuries ago, the Gods sealed the doors to their worlds, locking their people outside. Trapped in the country of Vaega, refugees from all four realms must live in peace under the rule of a tyrannical "Holy King." The four families descended from the Gods themselves carry small remnants of their namesakes' power, and they all compete for the favor of the King. When one family of heirs realizes their world is slowly dying, they decide to make a plan to tear down the seals and find their way back home. But facing the King, the Gods, and the other heirs to do so is far more treacherous than they could ever have imagined.

City of Dusk has so much going on. I mean that in the best way possible. Monsters, morally gray protagonists, powerful Gods, political intrigue, terrifying magical abilities, demon-summoning cults, you name it, it's in there. Every moment is filled with twists and surprises. Every character is set up with impossible choices and has to decide which of their morals they're willing to compromise for the survival of their people. I can promise there is not one point as a reader where you will know what will happen next, and it makes for a spectacular reading experience.

Because of the complex plot and world-building, there are times when the book feels like it drags a bit. But we are setting up a whole series here, so that's pretty par for the course. If you can get through the intense build-up the payoff is absolutely worth it. There's more than one reveal that had my jaw on the floor.

Because of the above mentioned, I rated City of Dusk 4.5 out of 5 stars. It was an incredible read and felt reminiscent of Six of Crows due to the multiple POV and plotting. Another book I would compare it to is The Mask of Mirrors.

While there's no overtly explicit content, there is brief sexual content, pervasive cursing, and a heavy dose of violence, so I would only recommend this book to readers 18+.

I truly loved this novel and can't wait for the next installment.

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Much like a few other first-of-the-series fantasy books I have picked up recently this book took awhile (for me) to get going and grab my attention but once it did I really liked it and the end was quite a ride! I will also say that when I started this I was having a hard time focusing on...much of anything really...so it may have been more me than anything else. But fantasy world-building does take some time so just be patient! It switches between multiple character POV which I really enjoy. I am excited to see where this series continues! I also hope (and assume) there are some maps in full release which I will need to look up ASAP.

Also isn't the cover just beautiful!