As of writing this review, I’ve read all three available books.
“Born of a pyre ten thousand souls strong. When stars are right his home will die.
Hollow of heart; black hunger unending. Eater of light. Vanquishing kings.
Doom in hand; pour loose the sands of time. Ender of hope. Feller of storms.
Twinmaidens blood stains; on sorrowful soles. Fast claimed war’s domain. Glad of war. Glad of pain.
Beast eyes close for him. Vault’s gates open.
Starbreaker, thrice named.
Starbreaker, awake.”
—Prophecy of Aion Origin, date unknown
Sylvas Vail is a big fish in a small pond, the most powerful mage on his planet. But when the doors to the cosmos come crashing open and all the untold wonders and terrors of the universe come pouring in, he is left with only two options:
Ascend or die.
I have so many mixed feelings about this series!
On one hand, there are certain apsects I adore about it, but also some parts truly aggravate me! So with that hook, let us dig in!
We follow Sylvas from young orphan to most-powerful-mage-on-his-planet, and that only takes a couple of chapters to speed through in time! And then, oh no, his world ends, the Eidolons eat his world’s core, and only a small number of people are evacuated on spaceships by the previously-unknown Advent (the anti-Eidolon arm of the Empyrean military forces).
Great! The MC has just seen his homeworld and pretty much everyone he knows snuffed out, so this is going to be a high stakes sci-fi adventure, I can feel it!
And then Sylvas decides to join this Advent, and we head firmly into magic academy territory. Here there are very strong parallels to Iron Prince, which probably isn’t a great surprise given Luke is a listed author on Bryce’s series.
Unsurprisingly, the parts of Stormweaver I didn’t enjoy as much as present here too:
I wasn’t sure if I’d make it through the series, but just after the halfway mark in book three, the conflict stop being contrived and the actual global plot seemed to move after all this time. We got juicy lore, conflict that matters, and rapid character development, and it was by far my favourite section of the series to read. I was super keen for book four, only to find out its still in progress. I wish I could actually gush about this section, but everything would be spoilers.
So let us turn to characters. The best character, by far is Malachi. Distant second place to Bael. There’s a large cast, but each character has roles, a relatively distinct narrative voice, and serves purpose and depth other than “Random Teammate X” for Sylvas. Vaelith (one of his instructors) is both good (in terms of characterisation) and bad (her character gives me the shits). Sylvas also gives me the shits. Here are them both giving me the shits:
“Tell me if I’m wasting my time, Vail, and all of this will stop. I’ll wash my hands of you. I won’t push you anymore. I won’t drive you to be better. I’ll leave you be on this path of… of calculated mediocrity you’ve put yourself on.”
This Vaelith upset that Sylvas isn’t literally rushing to add circles (ie levels / tiers / whatever) as quickly as possible, even though he was recommended for stability and long term power not to. In every single training scenario, he has pushed himself almost to death. He has done things they didn’t consider possible. He doesn’t go the extra mile, he goes an extra hundred, every time. Vaelith at one points beats him to death for ’training’ and Sylvas goes along willingly. That’s separate to the time she beheads him. So all this eye-rolling crap about pushing him and is he even trying is so divorced from reality I literally almost put the book down to never pick back up. Vaelith can go die in a hole.
But Sylvas, oh man. After this conversation, he thinks (for the millionth time) about how he was manipulated on his home world to cause the apocalypse, and how the Advent is manipulating him again to shape him and turn him into their weapon. He resolves, over and over, to not be manipulated. To forge his own path. Blah blah blah. And yet, every single time there’s a scenario or he’s deliberately screwed over and manipulated, he just grits his teeth and tries to stubborn his way out of everything while still winning and remaining 100% loyal to the Advent.
My man, if you don’t want to be manipulated stop willfully going along with obvious manipulations. Just say no? Leave? Sylvas almost does it when offered instruction by the best academic on the training planet, but doesn’t. Every time he thinks about being manipulated now I also roll my eyes and wish I could reach through the book to punch him in the face.
I suppose the fact I care enough instead of being apathetic about it does mean I’m invested in the story, though. Right?
In terms of combat, yeah, there’s a ton of it. It’s well done, inventive, and every combatant has their own powers and tactics.
Here’s a tiny nit, though..
AFFINITY SPOILER ALERT!
Sylvas is a gravity mage. He manipulates gravity. He can increase it. He can decrease it. From what he’s done, this seems to also include inertia and mass manipulation, but it’s not quite stated outright, which has me wondering if there’s some physics misunderstandings going on. Here’s an example:
He was falling from a far greater height than he had from the tower back on Croesia… In an instant, he could strip himself of all weight and land delicately… At the last moment, he stripped away all his weight. He was already speeding down at terminal velocity, so landing hurt, but with his own Embodiment and the assistance of the boots, there wasn’t enough of an impact to do any real damage.
Like, HOLD UP. Sylvas is in freefall, he is already weightless. Stripping away his weight does literally nothing. Hitting the ground at 200 km/hr, weightless, weightful, still means you go splat. In exactly the same way as being fired out of a horizontal cannon at a wall has you go splat. Weight and mass being used as equivalent things is done constantly, which annoys me so much! I am, however, an astrophysicist by trade, so gravity is like my special baby and people getting it wrong hurts me probably more than is healthy. Therefore I correct the terms in my head and assume Sylvas can also manipulate mass.
With all that aside, the paradigms and embodiments (ie mental and physical talents) that he develops and implements are very well done, they’re interesting and add a lot to the story. The varied use of gravity/mass powers is inventive, and now that the plot is moving in book four, I will be coming back to see what happens.
Anyway, there are the ups and downs. Anyone who loved Iron Prince or just combat-focused magic academies in general should give this a read.
