I received an arc of the book from Netgalley for an honest review.

This is an interesting series/concept, with gods than can be made and a set of characters that have different sets of changing ethics, making the story more nuanced, and definitely dark. This is a second book in the series, but didn't slow down and there were plenty of twists and turns, making the end closer, but still a bit opaque.

In this story, betrayals, or changes in motivation are common, especially as the context from historical events are laid out.

I'm not sure where the story will end up, but I'm definitively along for the ride.

CONTENT WARNING: forced drugging, murder, blood, gore, violence, torture, transphobia, suicide, murder of a child, religious intolerance, homophobia, massacre

After the shocking cliffhanger ending of book 1, I had to jump into this one as soon as possible. I was expecting it to be exciting, but I had no idea how thrilling this book was going to be. It was full of even more intrigue, betrayal, battle, and even some … romance? Yep, all that and more.

I think what I liked best about this story is the way Dalglish let Cyrus take a little step back so that the other characters could shine a bit brighter. We still get plenty of Cyrus chapters, but we also get to see things from the POV of the other major players in the story, including Mari, Stasia, Rayan, Keles, Arn, Sinshei, and even Soma, as well as a new character we haven’t met before, Eshiel.

By getting chapters from so many of the characters we know, we really get more insight into each of their inner thoughts and conflicts. There’s a lot of character development and growth, as their belief in both their gods and their rebellion is challenged throughout the book, and they’re forced to rely on each other more and more both in battle and as emotional supports. It was especially intriguing to see some of the tougher and more closed-off characters open up, like Mari, Stasia, and Arn. I also really liked Eshiel’s character, who is explicitly transgender, and how trans people are approached in this world as twice-born and just a normal part of Thanet’s society.

The overall theme of brutal colonization and religious intolerance are explored even more deeply in this book. The empire of Gadir forces their beliefs as the only acceptable way on every land that they conquer, killing the gods that walk among the people and elevating their own laws and beliefs, and wiping out any form of rebellion that they encounter. Their laws are especially oppressive, not only because it takes away the strongly held religious beliefs that people hold, but because it also removes the acceptance that same-sex couples and transgender people had to simply exist as part of their society.

Dalglish also has an immense talent for writing villains that you love to hate. With the introduction of Galvanis vin Lucavi, the empire’s Heir-Incarnate, we meet one of those villains that is easy to hate but not so easy to get rid of. He provokes conflict throughout the book, with basically everyone he comes in contact with, and there’s an overall feeling that we don’t have his full measure since he seems like he’s always plotting or manipulating. But then again, it feels like everyone is always plotting and manipulating in this book, and that’s what kept me hooked.

This is an incredible series, and the second book was even better than the first. The action was fantastic and nearly non-stop for the second half of the book, and it left me curious about what’s going to happen in the third book, which I can’t wait to get my hands on. I had so many emotions while reading this, and it left off on another cliffhanger that has me incredibly impatient for the next book. But patience is something I have to work on, since this book isn’t released yet.

Reeling from recent revelations about his homeland and then man who trained him to be an assassin, Prince Cyrus has left his revolutionary group. Despite his desire to free his people from the tyrannical Everlorn Empire, Cyrus can’t condone the actions his mentor took in pursuit of the cause. Cyrus is aimless, until rumors reach him that one of the country’s slain gods has been reborn in a remote region of the island. Cyrus sets out to confirm the rumors, but what he finds will shake not just his faith, but the faith of some of the most powerful paladins in the country.

THE SAPPHIRE ALTAR is a return to the dazzling set pieces of THE BLADED FAITH, tempered by a heavy dose of introspection. The author knows how to write an excellent fight sequence, and you’ll find plenty of them here, between demigods, paladins, and outright gods alike. It almost became too much of a good thing; how do you continue to up the stakes when you’re constantly living at eleven?

The set pieces are balanced by a lot of soul searching by the characters, and this was where I struggled a bit with the book. While THE SAPPHIRE ALTAR starts with a clear trajectory, the plot point in question is wrapped up early in the book, leaving the characters to wrestle with the emotional fallout. Multiple characters are having individual crises of faith, grappling with both their pasts and their futures. There are a lot of interesting conversations about religion, about the nature of gods and what shapes them, as well as redemption. How does one truly makeup for the sins of their past?

As a person who generally loves when books spend time digging into their characters, it surprises me that I bumped on this, especially when the character growth happening IS necessary. I think the pitfall of all this introspection was that a lot of characters were siloed into their own personal journeys, only slightly overlapping with each other. The result was that the story didn’t feel like it had a cohesive goal until someone shows up to take everyone to the finale. There wasn’t a clear objective everyone was working towards; they were simply continuing to fight the good fight against their oppressors, one day at a time. And sure, some days struggles are like that, you aren’t building towards anything big, you’re just trying to survive. But for me personally, it didn’t feel like the plot was driving towards anything, and instead I felt a loss of momentum.

That said, THE SAPPHIRE ALTAR does continue a tradition of intriguing reveals and unlikely allies heading into the finale of the trilogy. The stage is set for some significant confrontations in the last act, especially as the readers know some key pieces of information that our heroes do not. I’m looking forward to seeing how it all comes together when the final book of THE VAGRANT GODS releases.

My thanks to Orbit, David Dalglish and Netgalley.
It's just a funny thing, but I wasn't too impressed with the first book. At all! But, there was something about it that must have stuck with me, because I kept thinking about these people.
Truth is that I read so many books that I couldn't recall why I kept remembering them, not which story they came from!
Then, this book came up on Netgalley, and I knew.
Of course, I immediately requested this book, and "lucky me" I was approved!
This second book knocked my footies off!
There is no middle book syndrome here. Matter of fact, this story blew me away. I freaking loved this book!
The people, the Island and yes, even the fight scenes!
From a 3 star beginning for the first book, this definitely gets all the stars.
I need more!
Shut fuzzy! I loved this book!
Now? Crikey! I suppose I'll have to try other books by Dalglish.

As a guy who loves villains thai was a book for me. The hatred you develop reading this is top tier. The character work is on a level with Joe Abercrombie, and for me that's the highest praise. I think I can say the most about this by saying halfway through I bought the first book in the series. I easily give this 4.5 stars a wonderful tale told by a master.

The Sapphire Altar is a very good follow up to The Blaided Faith. I really liked how it gave voice to characters who had smaller parts in the first novel, like Mari and Arn, and developed them more. While the first book was more focused on Cyrus, The Sapphire Altar expands the universe in a way that feels necessary to create more tension and add more drama.

What this book lacks is the tight focus that The Blaided Faith had. It was more focused on Cyrus' journey, whereas this novel sometimes got a little confusing going back and forth between storylines and characters so frequently.

Overall, The Sapphire Altar is not as good as The Blaided Faith, but I still enjoyed it very much. It is easy to get drawn into the characters' lives and want to know what happens to them. I will be eagerly awaiting the third novel!

I was rather lukewarm on The Bladed Faith - it had all the makings of something that I should have loved, but while the world building and plot were interesting, I felt that it was lacking in characters development and relationships for me to be fully invested. In the end, I ended up giving it 3 stars, but after the way that it finished I want to see where the series went next.

The Sapphire Altar made up for this in leaps and bounds. The character development was so good, and now we actually had the relationships fleshed out on page (and not glossed over through time jumps) making the story and our investment in what was happening turned all the way up. Specifically the relationship between Cyrus and Rayan, and the exploration of Arn and Keles’ personalities were things that I wanted in book 1, that was delivered in spades here.

I also very much appreciated the recap at the beginning! More series need to add this in as a refresher after a break between books.

I’m now very much looking forward to the next in this series!

I loved this book. There is definitely not any second book syndrome here! In fact, I enjoyed this second installment so much more.

First off I love that David Dalglish included a summary of the first book at the beginning in case it's been a while since you've read The Bladed Faith.

This book includes all the action of the first book, but it delves deeper into the characters and the world. The many battles and fight scenes keep the plot fast and engaging. However, he evens it out well by taking the time for smaller character moments as well. This book looks so much deeper into the side characters that many don't feel like side characters anymore. This book isn't focused primarily on Cyrus as the first is. Instead you get to spend as much time with the rest of the group. During the first book I felt the world and magic system wasn't explained enough. However, I don't feel that way anymore. It may not be the hardest of magic systems, but I better understand how magic works in the story and I'm so interested in the story that I don't care. There were some twists I didn't see coming, but when I think back on both books were teased and plotted really well.

I cannot wait to read the third book and am mildly devastated by how long it will be before I get a chance to do that!

Let’s appreciate the brief summery of the first book in the beginning. Not a lot of fantasy books do that, but I think it would be super helpful. Bonus points for that, thoroughly loved it.

The fact that I enjoyed this one makes me realize I should probably go back and reread the first, since I did not give that one a great review. This is was interesting and fairly well written. I did not have a bad time. I think the fact that I am ready/willing to retry the first book because of how well I enjoyed this one speaks volumes.

Absolutely fantastic sequel. This series is so great and I highly recommend it for fantasy lovers like myself. Great continuation of book 1 and I am excited for book three. Highly recommend, if you enjoy fantasy.

Absolutely phenomenal sequel. I enjoyed The Bladed Faith, however this book made the Vagrant Gods a potential all time favorite series. Incredible storytelling. I cannot wait for book 3.

The first book was decent but I think The Sapphire Altar was better.. The story kept me more interested for some reason. I did think about what I was reading in between times I wasn't reading which is something that when I enjoying a book. The action was described well and somewhat brutal at times, but nothing that didn't feel out of place. I thought things were heading in a certain direction but was proved wrong and loved that really. Some deaths were sort expected while one character I thought would make it got killed. With the current direction of the I will eagerly waiting for how this story will continue. Thanks to the Netgalley and the publishers for the chance to read another interesting book. I think people will hopefully enjoy reading this one as I did.

I requested a digital copy in order to sample the prose on my phone (since I don't have a eReader) before requesting a physical copy for review. My review will be based on the physical ARC I read (if I qualify)

Words cannot describe how excited I was when I got this book (I already have it preordered as well) I adored the first book and am happy to report that the second did NOT disappoint

5 ⭐️ if you are someone who loves the gods among us trope as much as I do this series will be your JAM. Talk about an action packed ride, and just when you think you’re falling into a formulaic story of excursions with Cyrus and crew Dalglish is like…”hold my beer.” There were some reveals and climaxes that I didn’t see coming in this book, and I loved every second of it. If you want a story about resistance against the evil empire, but where the motives of said evil empire are explored and actually understandable…if you want a ragtag group trying to lead a rebellion (with many characters that are 30+)…if you want LGBT+ rep that isn’t a characters whole motivation for being in the story…if you want heart pounding action scenes and twists and turns galore….then look no further this series is FOR YOU!!

Thank you so much to the publisher for providing this e-ARC so I could review it.

Well I have to say that after reading this heartstopping second book in the Vagrant Gods series that it has now joined a very special place among my favorite ongoing fantasy series right up there with Justin T. Call's Silent Gods and Krystle Matar's Tainted Dominion. To be honest I was sort of expecting a slower paced second book but what I got was a follow-up that only doubled down on the action, treachery, and revelations regarding the history behind this tremendous story.

What I also loved about THE SAPPHIRE ALTAR is that Dalglish places more of a focus on other characters, rather than primarily on Cyrus. The chapters with Keles and Eshiel in particular were some of the best in the entire series I thought. Getting to experience these other viewpoints has also cast some doubts on what I thought I believed after finishing book one. When an author can keep you totally off balance like that to the point where you truly don't know who you should be rooting for, well there's nothing better in my opinion.

This book picks up where the first book left off as the extremely religious Everlorn Empire has now firmly entrenched itself within the island nation of Thanet. They rule with an iron fist and violently execute anyone who refuses to submit to the one true god. Any possible pockets of resistance are sought out to be crushed and eliminated before they can grow into something that could potentially threaten the empire's rule. Their main target being fugitive prince and former heir to the old throne Cyrus. But as Cyrus tries to gather forces for a successful insurrection to reclaim his country he soon realizes that he has some very real troubles of his own to deal with that could threaten to derail it all.

I mentioned on Twitter while I was reading this book that there's nothing more fun (at least for me anyway) than reading a book that has a purely evil villain that you absolutely despise. That villain comes in the form of Heir-Incarnate of the empire Galvanis. Every scene that I read with this guy in it had me wanting to reach into the book myself and put a dagger in his back. But it is also what made me keep wanting to turn the pages of this book because he was also such a charismatic and magnetic personality. Dalglish has written one of the more infinitely hateable villains that I have come across in some time. And yet even though hateable, I couldn't help but speculate that there was more to him than what we are shown at the surface.

It's hard for me to get into any specifics of the story without spoiling things so I will refrain from that. What I will say though is if you enjoy incredibly epic stories of good vs evil where the lines are sort of blurry as to which is which, then you need to read this book and series. It will keep you on your toes, wow you with intense scenes of battle, and cause you to cancel a lot of plans because you don't ever want to stop reading it.

I was a fan of David Dalglish before this series, but now I am an absolute devotee who will run to buy every single book that he produces. He's that good and I'm happy to say that he seems to be at the top of his game with the Vagrant Gods series. THE SAPPHIRE ALTAR has everything you could ever want in an engaging epic fantasy.