I didn't read the first book so it was so hard to follow what was going on and I was confused.

After I failed to read the first book in this series I haven't bothered to start on the second at all.

Beautiful prose and so so imaginative. Always feel I'm seeing something new.

Abandoned as I couldn't get through the first book in the series.

Having not read the first book in the series I found this totally confusing and could not relate to the characters.
I really tried but this just was not for me.

Toner wrote a great book akin to Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter's "The Long Earth" trilogy. Certain aspects of the story are told through various perspectives and their individual timelines and as things keep getting complex and the stakes get higher you'll be gripping these pages refusing to let go.

Another action-packed book in the monumental Amaranthine series, spanning countless worlds and millennia. “The Weight of the World is (on paper) shorter than “The Promise of the Child”, but you would not know that to read it – so much is crammed into the 450 odd pages, that at times you feel like you have been struck with a library’s worth of universe creation (and destruction) story-telling.
Many of the characters from “The Promise of the Child” reappear, but now their paths become increasingly perilous as they lurch from one battle to the next. The multiple story strands, although on the surface unrelated, are all power grabs by different factions of immortals (not all Amaranthine), with the multitude of Prism species bearing the brunt of the devastation. What any of the immortals really want to achieve is unclear. The nihilistic, universe-wide destruction seems unlikely to be heading towards any sane goal, but then the immortals are not exactly known for their sanity. “Nobody – nobody human, anyway – lived beyond thirteen thousand years. It was impossible. All the powers they’d dreamed of, inconceivable abilities and insights, would never come to pass” – but it doesn’t stop them trying.
My favourite character, Lycaste, is developing into a mature and brave young man, finally able to look beyond his own selfish needs and desires. He is accompanied by the Vulgar, Huerepo, and dragged along by the Amaranthine, Maneker, to find a long forgotten potential ally. Meanwhile, the immortal Jatropha is escorting the sisters, Eranthis and Pentas, in a huge caravan across the Old World to the family of Pentas’s child’s father. Sotiris, still searching for his dead sister, alternates between lucidity and dementia – not what you would want in the newly proclaimed Amaranthine “Firmamental Majesty”. And Aaron the Longlife continues orchestrating universal mayhem. Other Amaranthine are also stirring up trouble, while the Prism species, Melius, Lacaille, Jalan, Vulgar, Pifoon, Zelioceti, Bult … all have their own agendas – which may or may not be linked to Amaranthine machinations.
There is, finally, an alien species, the Bie, who provide a cursory lesson in deceiving appearances. One newly introduced Prism species is the tiny, but industrious and excessively loyal Oxel. I kept visualising them as loveable little yellow Minions. Probably not the way the author would have pictured them, as they are supposed to be hominids.
The universe with its planets (normal and hollowed out) and tethered moons are beautifully described: “Seas glimmered like damask where the light burned twinkling across them; lands shone dully in claret veins lined with gold and green, the colours of their mountain peaks scraped away to white blades that pointed dagger-like to the centre”. When you include countless humanoid species, and the complex, Byzantine plots and warring factions, the scope becomes just too vast to be absorbed and comprehended on a single reading. Thankfully, this volume does have glossary at the end, listing the characters, places, ships and species. So, there is a bit of help at hand. I tended to read the book on the Kindle, while having the paperback on hand with the glossary open.
I loved this book, and am really looking forward to the next installment.

The Weight of the World by Tom Toner

The Weight of the World continues the extraordinary Amaranthine Spectrum series that began in such spectacular, wondrous style with The Promise of the Child. Don’t even think about reading The Weight of the World without having read The Promise of the Child first. This is not a series to dip in and out of. This is a series to lose yourself in, to become enchanted, to fall lost in wonder through its myriad of worlds, marvelling at its wealth of species, both grotesque and beautiful. This review assumes you’ve read The Promise of the Child first. If you haven’t, don’t deny yourself the pleasure any longer.

It is the 147th century. Mankind as we know it has evolved into a range of forms we would barely recognise, some even a hybrid of man and animal. But humans were not the only hominids to originate on Earth that evolved and settled across the Galaxy, living within hollowed out planets and moons – there were others and their legacy is astonishing, terrifying and utterly fascinating. A few humans, though, have survived the millennia as the Amaranthine, immortals with great power, with memories of a distant human past. But immortal they might be in theory, in practice all too often they end their lives in madness and despair, crushed and altered by the weight of time. Once the Amaranthine were revered across the worlds. But now their innate cruelty is revealed, their domains shrinking as war divides the Galaxy and other species compete for glory. Some believe that the longest lived of them all might be the one to save the Amaranthine. Others are more wise.

The Weight of the World continues where The Promise of the Child left off, throwing us back into the heart of the fight for supremacy and knowledge. Lycaste, a beautiful giant, an inhabitant of the Old World or Earth, continues on his mission to discover himself and put right a wrong he believes he has committed. Having left the home planet behind, he journeys with the Amaranthine Maneker (and a rather cantankerous Vulgar), not quite sure where he is being led. Back on the Old World, Lycaste’s old friends, the sisters Eranthis and Pentas, are on an extraordinary journey of their own in the company of another Amaranthine, Jatropha. They carry with them the hope for the future in the shape of Pentas’ baby. But the destiny of the child is far from clear and its burden is immense. This will be a dangerous journey. They will be hunted.

These are the two main narratives of The Weight of the World but there are several more, some of which take up rich swathes of the novel, providing other perspectives of the war and giving us insight into the great mystery at the heart of the Amaranthine Firmament. Each of these strands takes us to different planets and starships. The variety is immense and they each come alive due to the sheer quality of Tom Toner’s imagination and writing prowess. World building doesn’t come better than this. I really believe that. The things we see and experience! Some of it is utterly horrible, even gruesome; some of it is frightening (the scratch of claws in the dark); some is light and bewitching – there may be evil but with it comes love, not to mention humour and wit. Creatures who have lived for millennia have seen it all. There are also moments here that filled me with awe and wonder.

There is no doubt at all that this is proving a complicated, multi-layered story. I needed the glossary of names and places, that’s for sure (plus the catch up summary at the beginning). And the size of that glossary hints at just how much variety and breadth there is in these pages. But while it took me about a third of The Promise of the Child to grasp its wonder, there was no such delay with The Weight of the World. I was hooked from the very beginning. We haven’t yet reached the stage of the series in which we can find resolutions and there are as many questions as answers but I love the ways in which it’s heading as well as its pace which allows us the time to explore.

Tom Toner paints his characters and worlds beautifully, even when they’re at their ugliest. This is a clever, ambitious, inventive, wondrous series, brilliantly executed, that leaves me wanting more and soon. It might be only February but this is the science fiction novel to beat this year and it most certainly won’t be easy.

Other review
The Promise of the Child

The Weight of the World starts roughly where the previous book ended, I say roughly because it starts with a few historical stories from different points of view - Daniell and Ghaldezuel- before jumping to the present with Lycaste, Huerepo and Maneker in the thick of things.
Now originally I had this stupid idea that I'd be able to drop right in the deep end of this story and know what was going to happen - my expectations were that it was to be a lot like the first book The Promise of the Child and I've never been so happy to say otherwise. The Weight of the World is so full of surprises there was no way I could correctly guess what was going to happen in the next chapter.
We're still following the tale told from Lycaste's view more often than not and although there are several other secondary main characters (makes no sense I'm aware of this) the book doesn't feel quite so wholesome until it's told from Lycaste's view but then on the flip side it's have a new character that I love - Perception or Percy - a millenia old AI/soul that was imprisoned on a planet.
Perception - as his name suggests - is wickedly perceptive and incredibly smart; imprisoned as a five year old soul and left to linger and eventually 'die' he has all these ideas of how things should be done and takes a great joy in proving Hugo Maneker wrong once he has been freed.
In my review for the first book (which you can check out above) I made mention of a child that wasn't heard from since the beginning of the book - what I didn't realise until reading this book that he actually was and it was greatly done by Tom Toner on how he fed this information into the story and still kept the plot on point.
I learned a lot about each of the characters particularly Lycaste, Pentas and Jatropha (who I'd like to point out I didn't realise was an specific character until now *faceplam).
Lycaste has grown up considerably
Pentas, although she's gone through a pretty tough time is an selfish, manipulative and all and round horrible person
Jatropha has fingers in many many pies.
The break down between the Vulgar and the Lacaille was stellar and Huerepo is the perfect character to put this across - a stark contrast to his Lacaille equivalent Ghaldezuel whom has a lovely traitorous streak in him, something that I wholly did not expect.
There were fights in space and an abundance of alien species once again and a firm understanding of Old World history versus present; a humourous trip in space with Huerepo's cousin who is like a mini version of a sarcastic, cockney-esque Butler.
You can tell in this book that Tom Toner has settled into his author boots with aplomb and I can only imagine that he will continue to grow from strength to strength and I can't wait to see where he takes the Amaranthine Spectrum next.

Thanks to NetGalley for a review copy.

I loved 'The Promise of the Child', and I'm very happy to say that 'The Weight of the World' is even better. We're back into the adventures of Lycaste and an ever growing cast of characters, including the wonderfully written Perception (not going to give ANY clues about that). The Firmament is fleshed out, and the Old World explored in a way that had me checking maps to figure out where the journey was taking some of our main protagonists.

Tom Toner is a world builder up there with Iain M Banks and Terry Pratchett, in my opinion, and lovers of sometimes surreal sci-fi should get it ordered right now.