Picking up where Malice left off, Valor picks up the pace considerably. This is an epic that reminded me a bit of The Lord of the Rings with the stakes of Song of Ice and Fire. Make your heart a stone reading this because there is heartbreak after heartache in this installment. While there are some flaws in writing and the story, I couldn’t help but be pulled into the struggle of each character. The tragedy and hopelessness of Maquin’s ordeal pulled on my heartstrings along with Corban’s and his sister’s plight, Edana’s loss, and many others. Reading this frayed my nerves and pulled at my emotions.

Truly captivating book that imagines the perfect world and weaves in a plot brimming with honor, avarice, selflessness, greed, and all the human nature tendencies, good and bad. While I noticed a few minor inconsistencies, they didn’t ruin the writing too terribly and I found myself engrossed in the world and the story. The setting is well thought out, the writing is not overly verbose yet still picturesque, the main characters are likable and while not necessarily complex, they’re also not shallow. While the ending might be a bit predictable, there were still a few twists and turns I didn’t see coming. For readers who enjoy books that have hidden depths to them, this one I found to be the Challenger Deep. There’s so much packed in with immortality, sentient AI, politics, philosophy, and so much more. Definitely will be moving on to the next in the series.