Son of the Black Sword

In this we have an order of people who enforce the Law. Yes, with capital L. They are super trained people who go around keeping the population in line and also killing demons coming from the oceans. Among them the most hardcore one is Ashok, whose whole life is about his work, while he has no other hobbies, interests or connections.
But even when he thinks he knows everything.... can he really? The slaves are rebelling, the important people are scheming and things aren't as easy as he thought.

This book is something else. So many fantasy stories are relatively simple by structure without any that big surprises and twists. I'm not saying those are necessarily bad, I do love some of them a lot, but here the world building, the concepts and the rules are just different enough to make it unpredictable. I had no idea where the things were leading. Honestly, still no idea what is going to happen later on and I'm sure as hell going to read the sequel. (At this point in time only this and the second part of the series is released, which is something to note for many people who only read finished series. Larry Correia is pretty damn trustworthy among authors so I have no doubt about him going on and finishing it, just saying.)
First of all, the story is set in a huge kingdom (not that original) that is mostly similar to India (that kind of is). There are references to elephant-headed gods of a long forgotten culture, the society is built on castes and even the different landscapes are sounding similar to what you find in India in surrounding places. While the big themes of heroics and rebellions and such are pretty universal across cultures this story has some sort of a special flair that I actually really enjoyed. It also doesn't do the annoying thing that happen in many fantasy novels outside the European historic and cultural foundation; it doesn't make it so every other culture is magical and mystical and perfect. So many still can't get over the fact that every continent, culture and group is equally likely to have flaws.
Then we have the characters. Ashok is as black and white as you can get. Wait a minute, what? I don't like that! I don't like those kinds of people. But hey, the whole story is about him having to face that his beliefs and things he thought he knew were far more complicated than he assumed. He is not a nice person, not at all a fluffy kind of guy. Honestly, he is mostly just scary and unfeeling (for a reason, though), but then you see some things coming to the surface and him having to get used to... caring, I suppose. At one point he tries to smile, which horrifies the people with him. That was hilarious.
Lastly, the powers that are at work pull people in so many different directions and they all have their fully realised plans and goals. I sincerely believe things will turn out fine, though not necessarily without tragedies and losses, but at the same time the equations are complicated here. The culture and social structures are well-realised, which is an absolute must in a story that's about things being way too rigid and change coming. Which is appreciated.

It's still so badass. Must be hard to balance badassery and structure like this and I still appreciate when we get some action scenes of Ashok going all sorts of apeshit with his magical sword and superior military training against crazy odds. So there is that as well, gore is not over the top, but there is some nasty things. Closer to the end there is one specific scene where he has a crazy fight against someone monstrous. It made me go “oooooh, shit” audibly. Otherwise it's a fairly okay fantasy book, I wouldn't worry about it too much.
Among standard fare fantasy this isn't even extremely long, which is a nice change of pace with all the doorstoppers around.

I would absolutely recommend this to anyone who likes fantasy. It's fun, action-packed, interesting and just generally a good read.

Have a nice day and don't take a gun to this knife fight! It's not going to be enough.