An Echo Of Things To Come

This author just made it to my total fanboy heart. I'm rarely this excited about new anything. I mean, I'm usually excited to some degree or another, but I usually reserve this kind of energy for authors I know and have trusted for years.

Welcome to my heart, Mr. Islington. :)

These characters are absolutely wonderful, from the great reveal at the end of the last book to the full-out disclosure and development of a certain beast character in this one. I love them all. It's true. Every single step of this story has been a real delight.

There's lots of magic, time-stopping fights, energy-draining epicness, an enormous amount of history and strife and memory-crunching reveals and even gods.

But more than that, the story is twisted. The magic show more is used almost like a hard SF tale, with complicated moving parts and some of the old uses are truly horrific. No spoilers, but once I started learning all about the barrier and the other land and so much of the high-magic-technology, I've been bouncing in my seat.

I wouldn't be surprised if these books didn't become as immortal as some of its main characters. :)

Joyfully, I have no issues with the directions taken in the middle plots. It was all fun and a delight to run in, even if it didn't propel the main story sequence in big parts. I was invested.

But most importantly, this is definitely going up there as some of my absolute favorite epic-fantasy series. You know, the ones with huge page counts, enough magic to choke nations, and a strife that spans millennia.

I'm a SUCKER for any book that goes BIG! Not just word count, but BIG IDEAS. :) show less

An Echo of Things to Come by James Islington completely hooked me. It's a masterclass in building anticipation. Unlike some sequels that info-dump revelations, Islington takes a patient approach. The story unfolds like a blooming flower, each chapter revealing a new layer of the complex world and its intriguing mysteries. This deliberate pacing might seem slow at first, but it serves a purpose. It allows the characters to truly come into their own. We witness their internal struggles, their strengths tested, and their vulnerabilities exposed. As they grapple with their pasts and the burdens they carry, their personal growth becomes deeply intertwined with the fate of the world, making them all the more relatable and their triumphs all show more the more satisfying.

Despite the slow reveals, Islington weaves a captivating narrative, rich in world-building and laced with suspense. Each new discovery feels like a hard-won victory, leaving you eager to delve deeper. This entire trilogy has become a favorite, and I can't wait to see where the journey takes us next. Believe me, I'm diving straight into the third book, The Light of All That Falls! show less

This was great, but just not quiiiiiite as good as the first book. This was much more confusing and although by the end I feel like I understand things a bit better, I am still very unsure. I guess things will probably be explained and wrapped up by the end of the third book in which case I might look back on my experience with this differently and be like "ohhhhhhhh", but having not read that yet I can't say if everything will pay off yet. This is very much a "middle" book, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I spent a lot of my time reading this thinking "whaaat are they talking about". There are a lot of flashbacks here and issues with memory loss, which are necessary and did draw me in, but the timeline is SO difficult to show more follow. None of the main characters really understand what is going on and there are a lot of different perspectives about how reality itself operates in this world, that as a reader you are really just as confused as the characters. On the one hand, I sort of think that's a good thing. Reading this book is like listening to a lot of different people try to argue to you why THEY are correct and you should listen to THEM, but they could be lying or just misguided and it's just impossible to know. The narrators aren't unreliable exactly, but the world IS unreliable. I love epic fantasy novels like this and I think overall this works, but the ending of this series as a whole really could change things for me. It's difficult to rate books in a series like this individually because of that. Overall I am enjoying this series and I feel like really it's just one story cut into three parts. This part was slightly more confusing than the first and I didn't love it quite as much, but it was still great and the story OVERALL is excellent (so far). show less

SPOILER WARNING: This review contains spoilers for the first book in this series, THE SHADOW OF WHAT WAS LOST.

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AN ECHO OF THINGS TO COME is the second book in James Islington's Licanius trilogy. I loved the first book of this series when I read it last year so I was impatiently looking forward to this one.

We pick up fairly soon after the events of the previous book; our heroes are settling into their new roles working against the impending invasion. Davian is at Tol Shen where he hopes to gather Augurs to help repair the spells protecting the Boundary, Wirr, the new Northwarden, is fighting an uphill battle to convince a resentful Administration that he can be trusted as their leader. Asha advocates for the failing Boundary to be show more taken seriously at court, and Caeden uses his portal box to finally get some answers about who he is and what his plan was before wiping his own memory.

All the characters have good arcs in this book, although Caeden's is the most interesting for the same reason that Memento is such a compelling movie (and an arc in a certain anime that I don't want to name since it would be a spoiler). The trope of a character making plans that involve them losing all knowledge of the plan but still succeeding has been done before but it's executed skillfully here. It goes well enough that we appreciate Caeden's foresight but there are a lot of variables involved and it would have been hard to suspend disbelief if it had been realized perfectly. The slow reveal of his flashbacks gives you just enough to be satisfied to wait until the next one happens but still eagerly anticipating the continuation.

The previous book had many scenes that were reminiscent of the Brandon Sanderson and Robert Jordan books it's so clearly inspired by, (much like how THE EYE OF THE WORLD borrowed heavily from Tolkien). This book steps out of their shadow and feels considerably more original while still maintaining the comforting classic fantasy tone that made the last one so good. It's a slower book than the first, though; it's clearly setting up plots and characters for the third book. Some subplots dragged on for a little too long, especially Davian's difficulties with a new Augur at Tol Shen, but it was a well structured book otherwise. And it answered a bunch of open questions about the world and its history which I wasn't expecting until the last book, so that was great.

Now I get to wait impatiently all over again for the third book, THE LIGHT OF ALL THAT FALLS. show less

I found the concept of the Venerate to be really compelling but the execution was a little off for me, as what is being told / shown is sometimes different. I also found that the information being told out of order was quite confusing. I really wanted to like Caeden's perspective but the best part of both books, I found, were the interactions between all of the friends which was really missing in this instalment.

I found Davian's storyline to be really interesting, but Asha and Wirr's both left something to be desired. However, the way that all the seperate plots and perspectives came together at the end was satisfying, as it always is with James Islington's books.

4 stars

This is book 2 in the Licanius epic fantasy trilogy, and things develop quickly. Although Davian is still the focal point, ghe amnesiac Caden takes a much more central place after the bombshell revelation at the end of book one regarding his identity. As his memories gradually return in this book, much of what is really going on here is revealed (and much still remains hidden). In the meantime, Wirr is drawn into a political morass as he takes his place as both Prince and Northwarden. And Asha is drawn into a pivotal role.

Without book 1, "The Shadow of What was Lost', this book would not be comprehensible, but that is the way of fantasy epics. It definitely builds enough momentum that I am looking forward to book 3 and hopefully, a big show more finish. show less

This was still a great book, don't get me wrong. The characters have great development, the twists and turns are a great time, and the world is expanded in a great way. But it does, I think, suffer a bit from book two syndrome, with lots of wrapping up loose ends from the first book that weren't going to go anywhere. Plus, there are also getting things ready for book three. But there are new characters that are invented that I grew to really enjoy.