The Blood Mirror

By: Brent Weeks

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 20 hrs and 30 mins

Publisher's Summary

The nail-biting continuation of the Lightbringer series from New York Times best seller Brent Weeks.

When does an empire fall?

The Seven Satrapies have collapsed into four - and those are falling before the White King's armies.

Gavin Guile, ex-emperor, ex-Prism, ex-galley slave, formerly the one man who might have averted war, is now lost, broken, and trapped in a prison crafted by his own hands to hold a great magical genius. But Gavin has no magic at all. Worse, in this prison Gavin may not be alone.

Kip Guile will make a last desperate attempt to stop the White King's growing horde. Karris White attempts to knit together an empire falling apart, helped only by her murderous and possibly treasonous father-in-law, Andross Guile.

Meanwhile Teia's new talents will find a darker use - and the cost might be too much to bear. Together they will fight to prevent a tainted empire from becoming something even worse.

©2016 Brent Weeks (P)2016 Hachette Audio

I waited to long to listen.

I read a review earlier on this book that said it was boring and all filler. I want go find that review and down vote it. There are massive plot advancements and bomb shells in this book. Action is a bit lite but dialogue is always deep and excellent. I freaking love this series. Rock on Mr. Weeks.

15 people found this helpful

The start to get very interesting...

As this series approaches the finale some interesting bits of information are revealed that change the way you will view some of the main characters, none more so than Gavin Guile. No character arc has been more full of surprises than Gavin's and the revelations about his past in this book finally explain why he is known as the Black Prism. Gavin is in a bad spot for sure but he may yet play a key role in shaping the future of this world, but not for the reasons you think. He also isn't the only main character shaping up to be a major player in the outcome of the war as Andross, Kip, and Karris all find themselves jockeying for position in order to influence things to their preference. One thing is for certain, this book sets things up for a conclusion to the series that will be hard to predict.

Although I can see why some people walked away from this series at the beginning, I am glad that I didn't because the story continues to get more interesting and the character development goes in directions that I didn't see coming. That keeps the series fresh and enables it to stand out within a crowded genre where it is hard to be unique these days. Brent Weeks has done a great job at slowly revealing facts about each character's past that makes you rethink your views of the character as well as the likely outcome of the overall story arc. In my review of Brent's Night Angel Trilogy I commented that I liked how he shed new light on prior events from earlier in the series that made you think differently about the characters (and their motives) and he takes that concept to a whole new level in this series. One book remains and I will be eager to pick it up as soon as it is available.

Simon Vance does another excellent job and the combination of Weeks' writing with Vance's narration leads to an awesome listening experience.

5 people found this helpful

Great Book

this book was different than the others of the series. It gave so much insight to the characters and to the situation as a whole. The twists are very meaningful to you if you understand what they imply for the characters. excellent job!

5 people found this helpful

Everything I told you in the last 3 books?

Just go ahead and forget about that stuff.

Seriously, there's so many plot twists that's be more accurate to describe the book as a plot knot. I think I wore "shocked face" for 3/4 or more of the book.

that's not to say it wasn't good, it was fantastic. but so many things get revealed that completely change everything that's happened and everything that we know that it's almost like we don't know this world after all, not after 3 books.

4 people found this helpful

Meh

Any additional comments?

This is the weakest book in the series. The entire book seemed to be focused on sex, and I mean the entire book...even ending with an author note on a medical issue regarding it. Clearly Weeks cares about the issue, but honestly it took away from the story. But whatever, even without that issue, the book itself didn't really go anywhere and was pretty boring. I usually listen straight through and couldn't do it with this one. I kept having to make myself finish it and listened to two other short audiobooks in between. While I do enjoy all the characters, this book felt like filler. Will still listen to the 5th book in the hopes it will improve. Simon Vance was excellent as always, thank goodness!

2 people found this helpful

good but not the worst of the 4 books

there's alot of cool insight to drafting and pretty cool plot twists , how ever unlike the other books kips story in this is less ... Dramatic ? the books really just one big set up for the fifth I guess.

14 people found this helpful

Cut short at a climax. No relief

Feeling strung along. Was it not finished, or are they stringing us along to sate the hunger for revenue?

Excellent half of a book...

12 people found this helpful

Filler novel

Marked release date on calendar. Sad that this was a filler novel. No emotional victories small or large, just grinding, plodding, story. This book contains the depth and emotional weight of a single chapter from the other books in the series. Seems like the author wants to drag out the story of such a beautiful story arc. Beyond impressed with the series until now. May try one more but depends on how long until release.

29 people found this helpful

Filler Book.

I have mostly enjoyed the lightbringer series up until now and was exciting to pick this up.

And I have to say after finishing this listen I'm left conflicted. It's not a complete filler book, and there's some interesting revelations.

However unfortunately those are few and far between. Everything relevant could easily have been summed up in a couple chapters.

Probably 80% consists of dialog between 2 or more characters, often with conflicting view points. It's literally chapter after chapter after chapter of this, people "squaring off" with talking back and forth.

So much so that I have the say the pacing really suffers, and remains mostly uninteresting, but I was never overly bored either.

Nothing is this book is griping, intense or all that exciting, it sort of just plods along chapter after chapter.

Hard one to recommend. But I will say if you desperately need something to listen to pass the time, and like the series, this will just be "ok"

11 people found this helpful

Doesn't signficantly advance the plot

I'm a Brent Weeks fan, and I enjoy the Lightbringer series. The series, in my opinion, is absolutely worth listening to.

That said, as far as the storyline goes, this is easily the weakest of the series so far. The plot is not significantly advanced by the events depicted herein, but it does offer up a great deal of character development for Gavin Guile, one of the two main characters. He is revealed to be a far more flawed character than perhaps the reader would have been willing to accept earlier in the series.

It is a long installment, and the events advance only a very short period in that time, but I did feel it was justified by the degree to which Gavin was changed in my perception.

I appreciated the commitment given to developing Gavin's character, but it was also a long wait for this installment, and now it seems an even longer wait for the next to appear.

6 people found this helpful