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Dec 01, 2020PimaLib_ChristineR rated this title 2.5 out of 5 stars
2.5 ⭐ Duncan's second entry in the Something Dark and Holy series, Ruthless Gods suffers the same deficiency as many self-published, or smaller publishing house, books I've read this year: lack of editing. The fact that this is a major release from a St. Martin's imprint makes that lack all the more unforgiveable. Did no editor look at the phrase "weird and eldritch" for the sixth time and think "hmmm, maybe we could tighten this up?" Or look at the hundreds of pages of Nadya voicing angst over Malachiasz, and thought "we could lose 50% of this and replace it with adequate descriptions of this world." Seriously, this is a world at war and has been for decades. As our characters travel along the whole axis of the front they see nary a burned out field, but more interestingly, they encounter no people. In hundreds of miles they come across one fort which is used for a dramatic face-off, but that's it. And the lack of editing is especially disappointing because Duncan has the bones of a decent story and interesting premise. I'm not mad that I read this book, but I think I'll be stepping away from the series at this point and calling it good.