Fire and Sword

Sword and Sorcery, Book 1

By: Dylan Doose

Narrated by: Mike Carnes

A broken nation in need of a savior.

Ravaged by plague, decimated by dark magic, infiltrated by a foreign evil seeking to dominate from within, Brynth is on the eve of its dissolution. When all the good men are dead and gone, who is to answer the call and defy what is wicked for what is right?

A Twisted Tale of Three Unlikely Heroes.

Heretic monk turned Sorcerer, Aldous Weaver. Infamous crusader turned fugitive, Kendrick the Cold. Aristocrat, rogue, monster hunter, and legend in his own mind, Theron Ward.

Three men condemned to die for their crimes find in each other both the will and the means to survive. A dark brotherhood with Sword and Sorcery is forged, and all monsters meek and mighty do fear the three.

Honorable mention in Library Journal’s Indie Ebook Awards and a Shelf Unbound Magazine Notable 100!

©2015 Dylan Doose (P)2024 Dylan Doose

Critic reviews

“An epic tale....” (Library Journal)

When bad guy's kill indiscriminately, look out.

Unlikely heroes, bonded by the grim reaper 's duties. Beauty and beast and boy, let the hunters become the hunted.

Interesting but underdeveloped

Parents: not for under 18
Language: R;(30+ I stopped counting) f bombs, bastard
Violence: R; extremely gory
Sexual content: R; sex, rape

Story: the storyline isn’t too straightforward, there are random flashbacks that, in an audio format, are distracting or confusing. It would be better to have the date/time announced prior to letters or memories rather than at the end. The characters lacked development and there could have been more backstory to give the listener a better sense of time. Overall an interesting story, pick it up if the description piques your interest. Don’t if gore bothers you, this is incredibly graphic in nature.

Narrator: differentiations and accents are consistent and well executed. Really brings the story to life

—I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Fire and Sword

Strong men!
Hard war!
Very few women that do not become wonderful heroine!
No happily ever after just blood, fire, and a mighty fine sword!

Really enjoyed the story

I usually don't listen to sword and sorcery very much anymore, But I tried it and was pleasantly surprised, The narrator was great, really kept me in to the book. I won't spoil it but I was surprised by what happened at the end, I thought oh no here we go everything works out for the heroes and they saved the day. I really hate those stories. Well you're going to have to listen to it to find out what happened. I was given this free review copy audio book at my request and have voluntarily left this review

It's Okay

I received this book for free. I am voluntarily posting this review and any opinions expressed herein are my own.

This is the first book in the Sword and Sorcery series. It is basically a complete story without a cliffhanger ending but the journey by the characters is not over as this book covers only the meeting of the main characters and their joining together for an initial adventure/quest.

There are many, many quest adventure fantasy books and having read lots of them, I was hoping that there would be something new or interesting in this one to really hook me. The writing, in general, is pretty good, although some of the humor is a bit immature. The charaters are interesting but not really fleshed out. The antagonist is very one-dimensional - it would have been great to know more information such as how the Emerald Queen came about, how long this plague was occurring, why she started this plague, etc. There are lots of cliches - so you can fairly easily figure out what's coming. Perhaps, the author will be develop the characters/antagonists in the next book in the series. I liked it but not enough to continue with the series.

The narrator, Mike Carnes, did a nice job overall with the different voices for the characters and the emotionality of his voice helped carry some of the action sequences to a more intense level, which I quite liked.