The Ruin of Kings (A Chorus of Dragons, 1)

I FINISHED!!!Honestly, it’s an achievement I finished this book at all since I’ve tried to read this book three times before and was unsuccessful all three times. The thing about this book is that it is confusing. Very, very confusing. This time I started this book because I was in the right mood where I wanted to read a book with no thoughts, and just be here for the vibes. And this book fit the bill.As confusing as this book is, I think I really enjoyed it. Is that weird? I would recommend reading this by e-book and audiobook together. The e-book so you can search names, places, and things more easily than you could with a physical book, and the audiobook because the narration performances are FANTASTIC and really do help bring the characters and story to life.Trigger warnings include multiple mentions and scenes of rape, PTSD, sexual assault, slavery, torture, suicide (part of reincarnation rituals), incest, graphic violence, mind control, body possession, kidnapping, misogyny, domestic violence, abuse, and murder.I will try my best to break down this story. But if I get details wrong, well...I tried.This story is told from three different timelines and by different POVs. Remember how confusing The Witcher TV show was before everyone caught on to the multiple timelines that were happening? This is like that.Our first timeline, and one that we see more in voiceover than playing out in real time, is the one told in present-day. Told in third-person, this is where we start with the main protagonist, Kihrin, in a jail cell with a captor by the name of Talon. Talon holds a magic stone that records whatever the holder is saying and wishes to record Kihrin’s story as they pass the time. In this present-day story, Kihrin is 20.The story then begins with their accounts of what happened that leads up to them being locked away together.We have Kihrin telling his story in first-person set in the past (he’s 16 here) where he is captured and being sold as a slave. He captures the eye of one wizard, Relos Var, and a group of vané. Vané are the last immortal race and the Manol vané here are a group of worshippers to a death goddess and their Black Brotherhood “cult”, as they are referred to, are able to come back from the dead. At least, that’s how I understand it.No, it is not at all lost on me how the Black Brotherhood name so closely resembles the Black Dagger Brotherhood created by J.R. Ward, and the vané here resemble vampires in appearance and agelessness, as well as the vané’s penchant to drink blood during their sacred rituals. Coincidence?? The word vampire does not exist in these books but if you were to give the vané a familiar name, I think it would be vampire.Anyways.In Talon’s recounting of events told in third-person, Kihrin is 15. Her story being us up to Kihrin’s retelling of his story. And Kihrin’s chapters brings us to present-day. It’s important to note that Talon is not human and every character she “tells” the tale from in their perspective are all people who have died and has eaten, or she has stolen their memories. It’s actually sad when you think about it, but I liked some of these characters.Then there’s a third narrator who talks in first-person, who inputs his opinion of the recorded accounts called Thurvishar. His comments add as a footnote throughout the story and is sarcastic but insightful. I found him funny. His character does show up in the story in Talon and Kihrin’s accounts and I think it’s surprising to see him in flesh and bone after only associating him as a voice in the footnotes. He has some pretty funny footnotes regarding his own character as well.Confused yet? Yeah.I think the only book I appreciated being told in a nonlinear fashion is WHERE DEATH MEETS THE DEVIL by L.J. Hayward, and that’s because the past and present timelines built off each other in parallel that worked really well. Here? It just didn’t really seem all that necessary, honestly. This book is confusing for a whole host of reasons, and the multiple timelines will probably turn a lot of readers off before they even get to the other reasons why this book is confusing.Let’s talk about names. There is an explanation for so many names being so similar, and it is actually part of the worldbuilding. But as someone who doesn’t usually read adult high fantasy, this was not fun to try to follow along with. We have a lot of names that start with a T and a lot that start with a K, and almost none of them are pronounceable without the help of the audiobook. This is before we add in the names of trying to remember or pronounce the places this book is set in.While there is a pronounciation guide at the end of the book, it’s at the END. Same with the glossary. How is anyone supposed to know any of that is there??? That’s the kind of stuff that should be at the front of the book.This book is FULL of unreliable narrators. This means that what you’re being told in one storyline from one character could change multiple times until the truth is revealed later in the book. This goes for the very, very complicated family tree of our protagonist Kihrin. This book involves body switching due to magic and lots of murder involved, so who’s really whose parent is COMPLICATED. The family tree diagram is a spoiler at the end of the book, and I’m not sure if it answers more questions than it asks even if you look at it early.Another layer of complicatedness is the idea of reincarnation and past lives. The questions are who is able to be reincarnated and who is able to remember all of their past lives. This is complicated, and trying to make sense of the different afterlives presented in this book are not clear. But just know that not everyone stays dead in this book, although there is an extremely high body count.Someone I haven’t mentioned yet is Teraeth. He is a vané who does remember his pasts, and he has a very slow burn (like HUNDREDS of years in the making) with Kihrin. Kihrin is a total disaster bi, who in this book, has too much to deal with and is actually just a teenager so he doesn’t necessarily think that he’s bi yet. Moments between Kihrin and Teraeth are hilarious a lot of the time. They like to needle each other and their banter is neverending. In terms of physical appearance, they are around the same age. However, when you add in Terareth’s reincarnations and immortality and everything we find out about Kihrin’s history, the whole thing gets more than a little murky.This series is apparently a polyam endgame with Kihrin, Teraeth, and someone we meet at the end of this book, so this romance has a while to go. I love slow burns that crosses multiple books, so to me, this is PERFECT.I am a sucker for spoilers and indeed looked ahead to some reviews for future books and this series is going to be very queer. And I am here for all of it!!! We have some ace characters in a relationship in the other books? I will suffer any number of confusing storylines as long as the romances are queer. I am simple that way.I think character-wise, the book is entertaining and a lot of fun. If extremely violent. Please do take a look at the trigger warnings because this book is DARK.I ADORE Kihrin, and Talon is a very interesting character. They definitely bring life to the story. This book, so far, contains gods and goddesses, demons, vampires (and maybe reptile vampires??? I think), zombies, and dragons. Like I said. This book is ~vibes~ for me. I think I got the main pieces of the storyline figured out by the end of the book, although I would be hard pressed to give a summary of what all happened.LUCKILY...the audiobook has an excerpt of book 2, THE NAME OF ALL THINGS, at the very end. What’s included in that excerpt? That’s right, a recap of everything you need to know going into book 2. So, if you need a reminder of what you just read, there is a convenient excerpt at the end of the audiobook to jog your memory.I think the narrators of the audiobook did an EXCELLENT job here. Vikas Adam (Kihrin), Soneela Nankani (Talon), and Feodor Chin (Thurvishar) are really amazing narrators and they switch between male and female voices very well. I wouldn’t have finished the book without the help of their narration, and I really appreciate how they brought the story to life!!Which is why I was so very confused at the narrator changes for the second book, but I think I understand now after some research. The events of book 2 run in parallel to the events in book 1 and is actually about different characters that will eventually catch up with the main storyline. These books are massive in this series (the audiobooks around 27 hours each), so the reader commitment here is actually asking for a lot. But one of the leads for the second book is actually part of the polyam relationship with Kihrin and Teraeth in the long run, so I guess I can deal. She’s also a demon. So, that’s fun. It helps that by the time I’m reading this, books 1 through 3 are out and we’re a month out from book 4’s release (out of a 5 book series), so I guess I’m coming into this series at a really good time.All I can really say is that I’m happy I finally finished the book, I did enjoy it, and I’ll be diving into the next book immediately!

If you haven’t read this book yet do not read this review, spoiler alert!Book one (The Ruin of Kings) of the Chorus of Dragons Series by Jenn Lyons was gut-wrenching, shocking, mind-boggling, amazing and dramatic page-turner, The story is in the 1st person, which is intriguing, interesting indeed. It makes it more dramatic and engaging. The story begins at a slave auction in the city of Kishna-Farriga where a teenager named Kihrin (Rook) is being sold to the highest bidder. The people that bought him did it to free him and not enslave him. It was a remarkable beginning without a doubt! However, some of the adventures weren’t very intriguing nor interesting. Suddenly, at one moment, though, he was struck by a crossbow bolt, shocking. He survived by magic. Another extraordinary moment is when Kihrin (Rook) meets Darzin D’Mon who claimed to be his father. He claimed he has magic DNA evidence that proves he is the father (whatever that entailed). Kihrin made it obdurately clear that he doesn’t want to live with his father! It was a dramatic and provocative moment. Then a slave was beaten to prove how serious Darzin D’Mon was, and what does Kihrin (Rook) do? He threw a coffee pot at Darzin and then attacked the person who was beating the slave and killed him! The audacity of it all! Someone else would be happy and embrace this opportunity and enjoy it and take advantage of it—not Kihrin, he was not very happy at all. He has attained a sensational turn of fortunes, but he doesn’t sound delighted. Lord Darvin D’Mon, the family and staff had the unenviable task of transforming a street urchin into a disciplined kid. In addition, he is being trained in magic as well—how to cast spells, etc. Ironically, Kihrin who was a slave was now buying slaves to do dirty work for him. He bought two slaves and sent one of them on a mission. Sometime later, Alshena (Darzin Damon’s wife) is poisoned and died, when Galen was told about it, he immediately stated that it must have been his father who poisoned her. Subsequently, Kihrin rushed to the scene. Subsequently, Khirin (Rook) convinced Galen to flee with him. The demons attacked the Blue Palace and the capital city left behind tremendous devastation, Kihrin is sacrificed as well. Emperor Sandus died; many thousands died.At the beginning of every chapter, we see the title and below it we see in parenthesis for example, “Kihrin’s Story”, that isn’t necessary, I can read the chapter and find out what or who it is going to be about. I didn’t see the logic in that.Jenn Lyons created some amazing characters—the most-developed and compelling characters are: Kihrin (Rook), Darzin D’mon, Surdeyah [adopted Kihrin (Rook)], Alshena (Darzin D’Mon’s wife), Talon, Xaltorath, Relos Var, Moria, Thurvishar D’Lorus, Khalindra, Miya, Teraeth, Galen (son of Darzin D’Mon, Kihrin’s step brother), Tyentso, Butterbelly, and Morea. Naturally, the characters that aren’t well established are: Emperor Sandus, Thaena, Dethic, Emperor Kandor, Emperor Gendal, Terindel, Khaemezra, Emperor Simillion, Raven, Faris, Bavrin (Darzin D’Mon’s brother), Kradnith, Prince Kelindel, Captain Jarith, Queen Khaevatz, Valrazi (Captain of the House Guard), Uncle Devyer (brother of Darzin), Aunt Tishar (great-great aunt of Galen and Kihrin), Merit, Veranagri, General Miligreest, Taja, Delon, Ola, Sir Rabbit, and Captain Juval. They lacked a background story. Their name is mentioned but nothing much else about them: what is their occupation, do they have a family, what is their agenda? Some of the characters had strange names, for example: Butterbelly, Juval (sounds like a Vulcan name in Star Trek), Raven, Merit, Rabbit, D’Mon, Doc, Talon, etc. The character dynamic between Lord Darvin D’Mon and Kihrin was always full of drama and intrigue, they always had heated arguments beginning with the first dramatic encounter. Kihrin is an insolent kid and very undisciplined. The Lord had his work cut out to transform him. Kihrin resisted a great deal. Darzin D’Mon didn’t like Galen, his other son, because Galen was too kind and doesn’t have the character of Kihrin so he wanted Kihrin to try and transform Galen ironically.Some of the places do not get the amount of detail they need for the reader to feel that he/she is right there in the midst. Steven Erikson who wrote the amazing Fall of the Malazan Empire Series gave amazing details of locations and historical sites because of his archeological background. The mimic storyline can be a bit confusing. Even though the series is titled “A Chorus of Dragons”. The dragons only appear once in a while. So much more dramatic stuff could have been done involving the dragons.I give this book a rating of 4 stars. Looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

A real page turner. A little confusing at times but you get used to it. Going to read number 2 now.

Well-written and highly engaging. An original fantasy setting, with a lot of attention to detail, and a huge amount of world-building that reveals just enough for it all to make sense, and to keep you wanting more. One of the best fantasy novels that I've read in a long time.

Complex world and character building expertly woven together over different timelines and storylines.

Great read and not too predictable can’t wait for next one

It has some good strong female characters, but overall it was disappointing. The soap opera-ish twists about family relations were confusing and a turn off.