Demon’s Reign

Overall, I thought this was a fantastic read. The part of the book that strikes out to me the most is the fantastic world building in this novel, it's really cool to read about a culture entirely based on living in/around a tree, and clear the authors have put a lot of thought into it and the lore of the world. It's a very unique setting. The story I don't think is groundbreaking as a whole, but there were twists I didn't see coming, and it was a fun time. Character interactions, action scenes are all excellent, and the novel is generally very well written. I especially liked the interactions between the main character and the demon in his body, very reminiscent of Venom. The ending of the book was satisfying and unexpected, and I'm excited to see where the story goes from here.

My one major gripe with this novel is that it's marketed as progression fantasy, and feel free to disagree, but this is NOT progression fantasy. I would even hesitate to call it progression fantasy adjacent but I could see an argument made for it. It's just regular fantasy, and damn good one at that, but progression is not part of it. The magic system has been designed in a way that there could be a progression focus in latter books, but it's really not there in this one. I will say though, I think progression fantasy fans would still like the novel.