The Shadow Saint

Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan continues much where he left off with the Gutter Prayer. The Shadow Saint continues our exploration of the wildly inventive steampunk fantasy that was introduced in The Gutter Prayer. This is a world where modern marvels create dangerous weapons and advanced transportation, but at the same time gods battle each other with their saints walking as avatars of their power across the world.

The Shadow Saint takes us a bit more outside of Guerdon, the main city that was the focus of the first book and introduces the empire of Old Haith (a land of necromancy) into the mix along with bringing the Godswar closer to the shores and even into the city.

The real star of the show here is just the sheer inventiveness of Gareth's mind. He is able to conjure the madness of gods into a world with steampunk sensibilities which creates this phenomenal melting pot of chaos. The addition of Haith, with its staid respect for history (which makes sense for a country where death is not the end), adds new layers to the world.

The Shadow Saint also manages to move us into a whole new set of viewpoints, yet the references to the viewpoints from the first book pervade and give the sense of continuity needed. The action starts up pretty close to the end of the previous book adding to that sense of continuity.

The Gutter Prayer remains one of the best debut novels I have read recently and this follow up is a worthy successor that adds further intrigue to the world.