Priest of Bones
Priest of Bones, Book 1 in the War for the Rose Throne series by Peter McLean is well put together with a strong narrative voice, interesting plot, plenty of action, twists galore and buckets of blood’n’guts. However, it was a struggle for me to enjoy. It is simply too similar to the award winning ‘Peaky Blinders‘ (a TV show I love) to feel original. The parallels are chilling. If you have ever seen the show, follow this simple recipe to understand what Priest of Bones is like.
Things to keep:
- The chief protagonist is called Tomas;
- A ruthless, deadly and beautiful government spy infiltrates the gang;
- Dirty gang ridden slumlands of an industrial city;
- Petty gangsters (now utterly brutalised having been conscripts in a savage war) return to find their powerbase gone;
- A harsh and hardened Aunt as surrogate parent;
- A national security threat;
- A corrupted and compromised police force.
The blood, guts and death are livid.
Things to change:
- Replace WW1 with the Crusades;
- There are only two brothers;
- The older brother is the thinker and the younger brother is the beserker;
- The Irish Republican threat is now a silent invasion by a mysterious ‘Scandic’ organisation;
- Introduce a fairly soft and indistinct magic system;
- There are no motor vehicles;
- Rather than rejecting religion outright, the chief protagonist is a fake priest;
- Keep catholisism, just give it a different name.
It is narrated in first person past. However, it takes a rather peculiar ‘stream of consciousness’ approach that slips in and out of feeling authentic. It rambles at times and there is a great deal of repetition. This certainly fits to the narrator himself being uneducated in the literary arts, but it does get wearying at times. Also, despite all the death, explosions and dismemberment around him, the main protagonist never gets seriously injured in battle.
It almost feels like the narrator is writing a memoir or giving his confession to a priest. The second might actually be quite fitting to the plot. However, on multiple occasions the narrator uses the phrase ‘as I have written before’, so it is obviously intended to be an account written by the main character themselves.
With all that said, the world building certainly has a very atmospheric feel to it. The squallor and hardship are real. The PTSD of the returning soldiers is tangible. The blood, guts and death are livid. The sense of threat and danger is oppressive.
This book earns 3 out of 5 stars for Peter McLean because, if you have never seen ‘Peaky Blinders’ and you enjoy hard bitten Grimmdark fantasy then you can jump into this and have a great time. Otherwise, try and find something more original that doesn’t feel like you are going back over old territory again.
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