Saga of the Black Warrior by Larry Correia (and a surprise!)
How it got on my radar?
A few days ago, I was watch Madison Goodyear’s YouTube channel and she referred to the Saga of the Black Warrior as some interesting story and that triggered my interest in the series.
Besides her mentioning it in her video, this is an absolutely underrated story in my circle, I barely hear the book tube or bookstagram community talk about this series. And there is always a feeling of elation in finding a story that nobody has heard of before everybody else!
A few things about the author
Larry Correia is a quite prolific author and he wrote series, such as Monster Hunter and The Grimnoir Chronicles; so I have faith that the author knows how to write a story and how to keep it interesting through the four book series. It includes, in order: Son of the Black Sword, House of Assassins, Destroyer of Worlds and Tower of Silence.
The blurb of Son of the Black Sword
With all this information, I read the blurb for the first book and I could not be more excited to read a series!
The premise of this story is fantastic: in ancient times, demons almost destroyed mankind and there was a hero, Ramrowan, that saved the day. Following these events, two more premises are relevant: (i) it was prophesied that that the demons will be back and (ii) only the descendants of that hero can defeat the demons, and it seems that the political and religious system revolves around the descendants of the hero, so they became the kings and all men served them.
With this exhilarating premise, many centuries later the survival of humanity, two main thing happened: first is that people do not believe in the prophecy any longer; in other words, nobody is expecting demons to rise. The second is that power corrupted the descendants of Ramrowan and they are tyrannical and greedy. There is no redeeming quality to them, apparently.
The story takes off based on this background and this feels familiar and unique at the same time; I love the fact that the enemy is both external - with the demons - and internal - with the people turned evil. In this context, there is a man, Ashok Vadal, who is chosen by a powerful ancient weapon to root the old ways out (and this seems to suggest that there is a few people who are trying to being back the demons).
This man does not see in shades of grays and he will eventually be exposed to decisions that will put him in jeopardy; and I read, in the blurb, there is war and rebellion! Just so many aspects of this world are calling my attention and I think that this story has so much potential to be engaging, to drive interesting themes and tropes in fantasy that make me excited.
Summary
So to summarize, there are a few things happening: ancient story and prophecy that color the world building; there is magic and magical artefacts; there are demons; there are corrupted men and there is rebellion. And, it seems that there is non-European setting for the fantasy world, apparently Indian.
Another book that should be on your radar!
Now, and on a minimal tangent, I want to read Indian inspired fantasy by Indian authors above everything else and there is a great starting point for that, a recent release with Sons of Darkness by Gourav Mohanty, kicking off The Raag of Rat series. And this is a priority read for me too!
Outro
Have you read Saga of the Black Warrior? What are aspects of the story appealed to you? Have you decided to read this series if you have not read it yet? Feel free to comment down below, with a sword emoji!
