The Shadow Mark

By: Mason Thomas

Narrated by: Marc Biagi

Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins

Publisher's summary

Auraq Greystone, once a military officer with a promising future, exists on the fringe of society. Accused of murder, Auraq is on the run from the ax—until two fugitives crash into his solitary life. One is a young man named Kane. The glowing marks on his arm pulse with an otherworldly power, and they have made him the target of a sinister organization called the Order of the Jackal. When the old man protecting Kane dies in an ambush, Auraq swears an oath to take his place.

But the runes are far more significant than they realize. They are a message from the shadow realm, a dark memory of the past—one holding evidence of a bloody massacre and its savage architect; one that will shake the kingdom to its foundation. Risking arrest and execution, Auraq fights to get Kane to the capital city where the cryptic marking can be unlocked. And with assassins close on their trail, Auraq might never get the chance to show Kane what’s in his heart—or the way their journey together has changed him.

The Shadow Mark is an epic tale of magic, murder, conspiracy, betrayal, and—for the two men tasked with unraveling the mystery—love and redemption.

©2017, 2021 Neil Couturier (P)2023 Neil Couturier

My new fav book. And WHO is this NARRATOR??? 😍😍

Let me start out this review by saying that Marc Biagi, the narrator, is superb. I don't think he's ever narrated another audiobook, at least not that I can see on Audible, and I hope he has a long and prolific career because his accents, voices, and acting are all just amazing, particularly Kane's. Simply amazing narration.

The book itself is also superb, and is now my new favorite book, and it's not even particularly close. I like fantasy novels, and I'm gay, so theoretically I should love gay fantasy novels, but in practice I rarely do and typically I can't even finish them. No offense to all the good ladies of M/M fiction but my GOD it is nice to read a book about men written by a man. Specifically it's nice to hear a book about gay men written by a gay man. Neither Auraq nor Kane are obvious, simpering, sassy stand-ins for a female author and that's so refreshing I can't even begin to tell you. Nobody is sold into sexual slavery--a very uncomfortably common trope in gay fantasy novels--and, although the book is romantic and sort of slyly sexy, nobody's nether regions are described in agonizingly minute detail.

Primarily what I'm in love with in this novel is the world building. Mason Thomas is no Tolkien, but he's a step above most modern fantasy authors and leagues beyond other m/m fantasy authors. The POV centers strictly around Auraq, so we rarely get the zoomed out feeling of, say, the Lord of the Rings novels, but in a way it's also nice to view the world through the eyes of a single character in it. There's such a real sense of place in this novel, and Thomas takes his time in describing everything. I also appreciate the politics of sexuality here. In a lot of mainstream fantasy novels, gay men don't exist. In a lot of m/m fantasy novels, the author goes too far in the other direction and makes the majority of the cast gay or, even more commonly, bisexual, further erasing gay men. This one strikes a happy medium.

I won't get into the plot itself to avoid spoilers, but it's gripping, the two leads are likable and complicated and the entire book is just beautiful. To the author: please, PLEASE release The Witchstone Amulet on audio and hire Marc Biagi to narrate. I may even try to overcome my distaste for Joel Leslie and pick up the first audiobook in this series as well.

Immersive and Engaging

Auraq Greystone once a highly prized military officer is now on the run as he was accused of murder. On the run, Auraq becomes entwined with two other men also on the run but for different reasons. Auraq takes on protecting the youngest of the two from would-be assassins. This changes his life and perception forever!

The author, Mason Thomas, weaves a masterful story of murder, magic, betrayal, and more! Each character is carefully and deliberately developed to blend seamlessly and authentically into the storyline. The dialogue is well crafted and enhances the narrative perfectly. This is an action-packed adventure that powerfully shows the importance of love and redemption in relationships. The world-building created by Mason Thomas was detailed and complete. The character development too was detailed and thorough. As a writer, Thomas’ strength is his attention to detail, creativity to create an immersive and engaging narrative, and writing effective and authentic dialogue.

Marc Biagi, the narrator, is very highly skilled with accents and voices. Biagi is very adept at slipping into each character smoothly and flawlessly relaying each one’s true essence. Marc Biagi further enhances the dialogue and storyline through his use of energy, emotion, and delivery style. Biagi excels in engaging the audience and skillfully immersing them in the narrative.

Together, Mason Thomas and Marc Biagi capture the audience immersing them into the storyline completely. A great combination! I highly recommend this audiobook.

There were no issues with the quality or production of this audiobook.

Masterful story and masterful storytelling

This is a work that engages from the first to the last page, the story is very good, the narration is superb, the characters are generally likeable, the world-building is plain good.

One little detail I liked very much is that the main character's character development happens off-page between the last chapter and the epilogue, when he accepts to work for the king. I like this detail because is one of the ways in which the work deviates from the canon of "there have to be character development"..

Also, the romance part was a blow of fresh air, because it was relatively light on drama, and it is M to M which makes it very sweet.

My minor gripes with this work:

- There are too few deviations from the sword-and-dagger genre. It's a masterful execution of an old recipe. But the recipe is old and well known, and sometimes that leads to boring predictability.

Great new narrator and a good book

I don't like to say much about a book as I personally prefer to know very little about a book before I read or listen to it. I enjoy the mystery unraveling. This is a fine fantasy tale with some gritty action and clever story telling. While I personally found the balance between story and explanations and descriptions to be a bit heavy towards the explanations and descriptions, I was never bored nor was I tempted to skip ahead.

What I really want is to applaud the narrator. He did a great job of using different voices for the various characters. You know who is speaking by the voice used. I only had to skip back once to hear something a second time because I missed it the first time. This is often a problem when voice acting is too clever or when whispering is acted out. I don't know how much responsibility for missed dialog rests on the sound engineer and how much on the narrator but this recording was great. In this case it was one short whisper and I got it on the second try. This is the only book narrated by Marc Biagi that I see in the Audible catalog. I hope he gets as much work as he wants. I started another book after finishing this one and was immediately disappointed that Mr. Biagi wasn't narrating it. If you want an original fantasy tale or to be introduced to a great new narrator, give this book a shot.