The Mongoliad: Book Three

For the third and final book in the Mongoliad (though not the last in the overarching Foreworld Saga, as the authors keep reminding us) I decided to splurge and buy the deluxe copy.  This comes in hard cover, has a nice map, sketches of some of the characters and the short story that they timed to come out with this book "Seer" which tells of a little adventure starring Andreas, who in retrospect, may be my favorite character in the series.

Before I talk about the story, I want to quickly discuss the deluxe edition.  It was somewhat frustrating because each of the deluxe editions has these same features.  Since they have different portraits in each book, by this one they are mostly characters who are inconsequential.  I have no problem with "Seer", it is just slightly annoying because this book references the story that came with the second deluxe edition, (that is also available separately) "Dreamer", much more.  With the greater number of references, it seems like it would make more sense to include that one.  On the map, they have the path of the journey that the main characters are going on, but they have that journey plotted to where it stands at the end of the book rather than the beginning, ruining a little of the suspense.  One final issue, is that the first two books are each ~400 pages.  This book, minus "Seer" is ~700.  I would have appreciated a slightly more balanced allocation of pages all around.

Despite all of my issues with the formatting of the deluxe edition, the story was enjoyable.  As with the previous two books in the series, the best part is the exceedingly well done sword fights.  They are done in a level of detail that is just not found in most books.  As a reader, you can tell that the authors spent a painstaking amount of time researching these.

The dual climactic battles at the end of the story work well (very well) but the politics of the cardinals did not really do that much.  Actually, the interactions between the characters in the political storyline and those in the other story lines are so few that it almost feels like you are reading two books in one: one about an election in Rome and one about the Shield Brethren.

Also, the story has hints of magic throughout.  Everything is explainable so far (and I like fantasy stories), I was just greatly enjoying the historical fiction that these stories are and I don't want magic to complicate that.

Lastly, the end of the story is so clearly a set up for more stories that it is almost painful.  Almost every surviving  character ends on some degree of cliff hanger.  Which would not be quite as big of an issue, except that I had imagined these to stand alone.

Because I had some Kindle Lending Library borrows available, I got two other of the short stories.  One about the father of one of the characters, "The Beast of Calatrava" and one about Ferronatus and Rutger as young men, "The Lion in Chains".  Of these two, the one about Ferronatus was much better partially because it filled in more backstory for characters that have already been introduced to the reader.  I am slightly worried about the future of the Foreworld Saga if they move away from the characters that have been established by their major book series and their major talent.  However, I love me a good cohesive canon and I am excited to see where the world goes.

I know I spent a lot of time on the negatives of this book.  Despite this, I did enjoy this book and it was a fun read.

Overall, I would give this book an 85%.