#BookReview Paladin Unbound by Jeffrey Speight (@jeffspeight)

 

Hello and welcome or welcome back to the blog, today I have a book review for you.





Paladin Unbound

by Jeffrey Speight

Genre: Fantasy

Series: The Archives of Evelium

Published:  July 1st 2021

Literary Wanderlust


There be spoilers below, proceed with caution!!

Jeffrey Speight gifted me a copy of his book a few months back (you can see that post here if you would like)  and I have finally been able to get to reading it. 


So for first of all thank you once again.


Let me start out by saying if you like D&D, World of Warcraft, RPGs and other things that are similar to these then you will enjoy the both the characters and the storyline of Paladin Unbound. Because to be honest with you, that was exactly the kind of thing I was feeling when reading. As a former (on long hiatus) WoW player it was Warcraft vibes I was feeling and well I liked that. I've rolled an Orc before, didn't get far with her but I did make one. 

Also can I just say how nice it was to have the main in the fantasy novel be something that is not human or elven. I love my humans and elves in fantasy. I guess well technically there is some human as Umbra is half Orc from his fathers side and half human on his mothers. 

The story starts out with Umbra the Peacemaker and his small band looking for work, they are a group of sell swords so to speak and they have come to the city to see if Lord Morrow will contract them. Umbra may not be fully Orc but outwardly his appearance is very much Orc and well people are not always excepting of this. 

People are going missing, things are happening and Lord Morrow wants things done quietly. 

So I'm going to back track because I lied when I said the story starts out with Umbra and his band of people. Because before that there is the prologue. The demon-god Naur is defeated and sealed away in another dimension. This is significant to mention because this is why things are happening. The worshipers of this demon-god are on the rise and they are trying to break the seal and free him once more unto this plane. 

Umbra has had a really crappy life when one thinks about it. His parents are dead, because his village was attacked when he was four years old. He spent days in a hollowed out tree waiting for his father to return but sadly never did. As an Orc he faces the different prejudice and stereotypes, and well it doesn't help Jeff Speight decided to hurt all his friends right off the hop of this book. 

But it was meant to be as it gives us character growth and introduces us to the Barrow Pack and my favourite character in the story, Shadow.

I'm noting going to go into anymore detail of the story and characters because I don't want to spoil the whole thing for you. 

So if you like self discovery, found friendships, mysterious characters (Shadow I'm looking at you), demon-gods, good vs evil, swords that speak into your mind. Then check out Paladin Unbound for yourself.

For a smaller in length fantasy the worldbuilding was great, with little down time, the down time that was there served a purpose with us learning more about characters or what they were going through.  

The only issues I have were with the flow writing wise, as this is a debut book things like that can improve with time. And I have all the faith in the world that future books that it will. 

But with that being said I am rather looking forward to the next installment. Jeff Speight has created a potentially great fantasy world, I can not wait to see what happens next in The Archives of Evelium.

I want more Shadow just letting that be known.

Add it to Goodreads

Pick up your own copy Amazon or Literary Wanderlust


Happy Reading


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