The Book Report #88
Episode #87
The Silverblood Promise – The Last Legacy Book 1
By James Logan
The Book
This book was first published in 2024 by Arcadia, an imprint of Quercus Editions LTD. Who are owned by Hachette UK.
My copy is a Hardback first edition and comprises 600 pages with an acknowledgement at the end of the book.
What Did I Think
Lukan has been estranged from his father and exiled from his home city due to an incident he didn’t create. Okay he wasn’t exiled but with everything that happened he exiled himself.
After years of being on his own, travelling the world. A steward, to his father, arrives to tell him that his father has been murdered. With his dying breath, he wrote a note, with just three words, in his own blood, and Lukan has to find out what it all means. At the same time, find out who his father was, apart from a man who spent his life in his office studying the ancient world of the Phaeron.
Mystery
He can’t return home until he finds out what the message means. And so he heads to the destination on the note, Saphrona. Here, he is supposed to find the final word on the note and finds out that the person is in prison for killing a colleague on the council.
Just so you are aware: Lukan isn’t very upstanding. He is a drunk and a gambler. He is not quite self-destructive, but enough that he doesn’t look after himself. And because of this, he is constantly getting into trouble with the wrong people. But still has the streets to get by.
Wondering around the city, he runs into Flea, a street rat. Which, at the time, was trying to pick his pocket. He befriends her slowly, and she helps him get around the city and join him in the adventures that follow during this first part of the journey.
Think of something like Indiana Jones and his sidekick Short Round. But Short Round beats on Jones when he gets annoying, and saves his life when needed.
It also looks like, over this adventure and future adventures. Lukan will begin to build a new family. And I think he needs it.
Multiple Genres
This is a fantasy, sci-fi, murder-mystery, action, and adventure story crammed into an under-600-page book. I am amazed at how much the author can write. The introduction fills the first 100 pages, and I am not sure if he had his own way, would have had the first part of the adventure finished at nearly 600.
But the story is never boring, it never dulls, and flows nicely. Lukan meets a lot of people in the short span of his first adventure, and each one, in the small space of time, holds off, to a point, on whether to work with him or kill him. So this book is also a dark comedy.
The book’s time frame is about three or four weeks, but most of that time is spent travelling, and the main action and adventure is just over a week. And the action is constant: when you think Lukan is going to have a bit of rest, the next problem occurs, and he can do nothing but move on to the next.
I am also interested in learning more about the Phaerons.
Would I Recommend
This book is a rare find that is not taxing on the mind, which could have easily been filled with massively detailed situations. Even with the large page count it doesn’t feel like a tough read. It is a smooth run on the brain where the adventure doesn’t seem to end. I am looking forward to the next book in the series.
So yes, I would definitely recommend this book.
Would you like to purchase your very own copy?
You could try these online stores: Amazon UK/USA. Waterstones. AbeBooks UK/USA, Barnes & Noble or eBay UK/USA.
Alternatively, you could try your local bookshop or even your local library.
