Sins of Empire Review
Title: Sins of Empire
Author: Brian McClellan
Date Purchased: 8/27/2017
Price Paid: $3.17
Date Finished: 3/27/2021
Rating: 4/5
Have you seen that Game of Thrones meme that shows a drawing of a horse getting progressively worse as the seasons go on? It’s a comical representation of how the show changed (and, as many believed, got worse) as the years went by. And while I agree that the quality of the show nosedived after season five, I think there’s an important distinction as to why that happened.
Part of the reason is, of course, that the HBO showrunners ran out of source material. When you’re working on a piece as expansive as Martin’s and you need to start improvising? There’s a good chance shit’s going off the rails. But I don’t think that was the only thing that drove the ship under. See, at a certain point the show went from being character driven to being plot driven. These rich multifaceted characters suddenly had much of their depth stripped away, making them take a backseat to a plot that was previously in the background.
But why, you might be saying to yourself, are you talking about Game of Thrones when you didn’t read a book in that series? Great question. To answer that I need to hop in the Wayback Machine and talk about the precursor to The Gods of Blood and Powder series.
When I read The Powder Mage series, I had just finished a six book series called Frontlines by Marko Kloos. I really enjoyed those books, and they were super quick reads…almost “beach read” quick. I was plowing through them in a day or two each. So when I started Promise of Blood I was on a roll…and that roll came screeching to a halt.
McClellan really took his time building up to the action in the first book. He delved into each character, talking about their motivations and showing their depth. As a result, the first entry to The Powder Mage series felt really slow compared to what I had been reading. But, as the series progressed, I was glad that he had taken the time to do so as the following books were of a much higher quality.
I was reminded of this about halfway through Sins of Empire. In some ways I found it a little bit of a harder read than the first book of The Powder Mage trilogy, but that makes sense: in Promise of Blood I was being introduced to a new system of magic, a new world, and a fairly unique setting. Even when the character development was taking place I was still looking to burn through chapters to get to more “new” stuff.
Returning to this universe brought a slightly different outlook – I already knew the lay of the land, so to speak. As the characters were being developed it was a bit more of a struggle to stay engaged, especially with the characters that weren’t new to me. But this is by no means a criticism of McClellan’s writing. I haven’t read a book thick with character development in a while, so it was a little bit of a shift.
Much like the first book, it was well worth the wait. The characters we meet are all rich and deep, and even through the span of this first book we start to see growth and development. The author has a talent for writing characters with many layers, some of which we understand quickly and others that will take time to unravel. We are treated to a few surprises, which made me start to look out for others…perhaps where there aren’t any.
Characters aside, the plot is a heavy mix of a few different sub-genres. If you took military fiction, political fiction, and high fantasy, shoved it all in a blender on the frappe setting, and then topped it with a few dashes of steampunk you’ll be heading in the right direction. Much of the story is heavily mired in the political machinations of the secondary characters and how all of the main characters get caught up in things. The plot is great, but it doesn’t feel like it drives the story.
And here I’ll revisit the Game of Thrones example – when you’ve got really strong character development in a story, the plot can be used to flesh out the characters. The world exists to tell the story of the characters instead of having the characters acting solely as vehicles to further the plot. You get that really detailed horse.
Of course, that’s not to say that the plot isn’t necessary…it’s just a slow build. Once things get rolling though, it takes right off and the reader is swept along for the ride as the story thunders to a brutal climax. For this book, at least. At no point is the reader led to believe that the overall story will be wrapped up in this one book, which leads to a good deal of “well, it’ll be a while before that plot line is resolved”.
I’m okay with that. It’s been good to get back to this universe.
Final Thoughts: Really enjoyed this one. Well worth the time spent, and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series.