This is the second in the Silent Gods series, after reading the first Master of Sorrows I was really excited to read this, I wasn’t disappointed at all , this is an ambitious sequel but it fully lives up to the Master of Sorrows. The world-building again is spectacular, richly in detail , I loved the use of language in this book, it definitely gets more complex in this second instalment this is fantasy at it’s most epic and I’m definitely along for the ride.

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy in return for an honest opinion

An ambitious sequel to the incredible Master of Sorrows. The world-building is second to none; richly detailed, lush and sprawling. It's fantasy at its most epic.

It is a good sequel but some parts are quite dragging. The pace got slower and the story was too stretched. But I hope to read the redeeming sequel. it is a good read though.

In the second instalment of the Silent Gods series, the reader is in for a rollercoaster ride with this fantasy epic.
It has a great feel of old and new magic - with much darker scenes than the first book, with a great cast of characters and the authors brilliant imagination. We are taken into a realm that will intoxicate any lover of fantasy fiction.
I’ve been hooked from the start of the series with the ‘coming of age’ storyline, the dark deception and Justin Call’s ability to draw you in to his world.
The main character Annev is a truly delightful invention and I can’t wait for book three.
The Silent Gods books are up there with any fantasy series I’ve ever read. Don’t miss out because epic fantasy doesn’t get any better than this. Just sensational.

Thank you to Netgalley for the eArc of "Master Artificer" by Justin Call.
In the first part "Master of Sorrows" we follow Annev. He lost his parents at birth and is raised by a wise priest. So far so familiar. However, Annev soon finds out that he is the villain of the story.
I found that aspect really interesting and I liked the whole first book. In the second book, the world becomes much bigger and is told from several points of view. I don't want to reveal which one. Two of the them interested me more than the others. Unfortunately, nothing happened in all the views. Occasionally, a chapter is quite interesting and you get a little nugget of suspense or important information, but most of it just dragged on for me. In the end, I put the book aside at 53%. I don't know if I will continue reading at some point. Basically, I'm interested in the story, but I don't think it's worth having to read so many pages just so that it gets exciting and interesting again at some point.

I really liked book one, even upon reread and i think i expected to like this sequel as much as i liked the first one, if not more. Unfortunately it was a bit of a miss from me. We go from one point of view in the first book to 6 in this one and it was a bit confusing. The fact that we also had that many point of views meant we couldn't spend as much time with each one and i just couldn't connect with any of them. I still want to continue this series as i am curious and i think what the author is trying to do is massive and can be a masterpiece. 2.5/5

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ARC provided by the publisher—Gollancz—in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 stars

Master Artificer is an epic, super detailed, and ambitious grimdark sequel to Master of Sorrows.

First of all, do not expect Master Artificer to be another accessible and easy-to-read epic fantasy novel like Master of Sorrows. I’ve seen the glimpses of the ambitions and world-building that Call planned for the series in Master of Sorrows, and even then, I didn’t predict that the changes would be this drastic. There’s no point in dilly-dallying by saying that this is morally grey or borderline closing to grimdark; The Silent Gods is now a grimdark series, simple as that. Honestly speaking, I wanted to give this novel a much higher rating because some aspects were utterly impressive. But unfortunately, some parts didn’t click with me.

“He was full of contradictions, yet he burned with the fierce determination to forge his own path—to never become another’s tool or take another’s life unless both necessity and his conscience required it.”



Master Artificer is the second book in The Silent Gods quartet by Justin Call, it begins immediately after the climax of Master of Sorrows, and this is a much bigger and complex installment in every possible way. Master Artificer actually made the predecessor looked like it’s a 400 pages prologue, and this is the REAL first book of the series. I won’t lie, I have mixed feelings regarding this book, and I’ll start with the parts that I loved first. I can’t even begin to say how amazed I am by what Call did regarding the world-building on the series. From the varieties of magic systems, the training montages, the destructive powers, the meddling gods, the multiple worlds, the multiple realms, the magical artifacts, sentient swords, dream walking, mind walking, prophecies, and so many more; there’s a LOT of world-building details to learn in this sequel. I mean it, practically every element you usually encounter in epic fantasy is here. And I also loved the storytelling decision to make this installment a more complex and mature story compared to its predecessor. The mix of real-life languages found in the terminologies and phrasing like nakama (friend in Japanese), tabibito (traveler in Japanese), somnumbra (Somnus means sleep in Latin; umbra means shadow) were ad nice touch, too. Admittedly, I didn’t understand why Oyru needs to speak Japanese, but oh well, I liked his character.

“Sometimes you have to make hard choices. You have to accept that, no matter what you do, some people may die—and sometimes those people are your friends—and the best thing you can do is help the person in front of you.”



In Master of Sorrows, we follow the story exclusively through Annev’s POV; that’s not the case here. There’s more than six POV to follow now, and surprisingly, my favorite POV characters were ones that I never expected: Myjun, Kenton, and Oyru. The best comparison to this expansion that I can think of is Blood Song and its sequel, Tower Lord by Anthony Ryan. By doing this, Call was able to tell a storyline with a bigger scope. However, the admirable world-building and heightened complexity sparked new problems to the overall quality of the narrative for me.

The inclusion of many new character’s POV chapters ended up being a double-edged blade. Master Artificer is a big book; it’s almost 900 pages long in hardcover format, and it’s crazy that I didn’t feel invested in any of the main characters now. I get it; The Silent Gods has been advertised as a series about Annev’s journey towards becoming a Dark Lord. Because of this, it is highly possible that it’s intentional for Annev to become unlikable. I appreciate that he’s trying to forge his own path, but his self-justifications for all his own actions were weak, and I couldn’t empathize with him at all. The only character’s POV I enjoyed reading, as I said, were Kenton, Myjun, and Oyru’s chapters.

“Any other choice meant someone was influencing his actions, and that he was acting on incomplete information. It meant someone was manipulating him. He wanted to know the truth, to know all the forces that challenged him, and then take his chance.”



Call is definitely one ambitious author, and the intricate world-building he put here will most likely play a huge part in the next book. Unfortunately, for this particular novel, the focus on world-building was a bit too much. I personally found that the world-building details he employed ended up bringing down his other strengths as a storyteller. The breathtaking pacing of the first book is missing here; it took me 9 days to finish this book, and I never felt compelled to pick it up whenever I put it down. The character’s development progressed too little to my liking, especially for a book this huge. Some dialogues were also repetitive—the arguments between Annev and Reeve were so dumb, and they revolved around “You knew, why won’t you tell me!?” countered with “Of course I knew. But I won’t tell you. Because you won’t like it.” And the last thing that absolutely didn’t click with me was Fyn’s chapters that started appearing in the second half of the novel. I honestly believe this novel would benefit a LOT from having his chapters completely removed; I get that Call is developing his character for future installments. But Fyn’s chapters felt thoroughly uninteresting, boring, and disjointed from the other characters. Note that I don’t mind detailed world-building, but it must not hurt characterizations and pacing. And this, unfortunately—from my perspective—happened in this book.

“Growing stronger means testing our limits. It means sacrificing our weaker parts in exchange for something greater.”



I know I’m being incredibly critical, but I want to clarify that I enjoyed this book. My main issue with Master Artificer, to put it simply, is that it felt like a 900 pages transitional/preparation novel for the rest of the series to shine. Plus, the ending of Master Artificer didn’t feel satisfying to read. To me, the ending felt like the end of a normal chapter; I would’ve preferred a conclusive or at least downright brutal cliffhanger than what’s put here. If you’re reading this review, please don’t let a 3.5 stars rating from me discourage you from trying this series. A lot of readers, so far, have praised this book highly, and I’m undoubtedly in the minority with my opinion. It seems to me like the second half of The Silent Gods series will be brilliant. Ambitious and detailed world-building is great, but never at the expense of characterizations and emotions. I sincerely hope Call will start connecting the threads between characters and all the detailed world-building in the next book.

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The quotes in this review were taken from an ARC and are subject to change upon publication.

You can find this and the rest of my reviews at Novel Notions

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This is book number 2 in The Silent Gods series. It flowed on beautifully after giving a summary of book 1 at the start. For those of you who have a memory like mine, you will love this feature.

If you enjoyed book 1, you will love book 2. And if you haven't read book 1, I suggest you grab it.

The covers... I haven't seen covers that I have loved this much in such a long time. I'm grabbing a physical copy just to have these beautiful books on my shelf!

This review contains minor/major spoilers and are not intentional. Thank you to Will O Mullane at Gollancz for providing me a review. All thoughts are mine.

This is a huge sprawling epic that I would not be able to summarize within an entire review, it is that good.
This is a masterpiece forged in the mountain of Kale. Somewhere I just wonder that this entire journey, this entire story is nothing more than Keos himself writing his own story. It was Keos that was cast from the Heavens, Keos that created goblins and unnatural creatures and for that, he was deemed unworthy. Everyone swears that infernal God’s name in this book because Annev slowly begins to realize that the world of good is no longer becoming good. All the adults that he looks up to in this novel to aid him to become in the end just that: villains. Many people claiming to help Annev are revealed to be some obscure servants of Gods or maybe Keos himself because Annev wears the golden hand of that God. And sometimes, it makes me wonder. What does Keos get out of all this at the end? He may be silent, but he is no fool. Keos is a master manipulator.

And this novel very clearly explains how good-natured people can turn into evil. Annev’s whole journey is like a parallel to this. Let’s not forget, however, that Kenton is swearing revenge against him, for what obscure reason I am not particularly impressed with. Kenton was in love with Myjun, but did she ever return his affections so favorably once he was scarred? Myjun learns with her mentor, Oyru, and she discovers truths that are far more shocking when you read this story. I urge you, to read ALL the lore of this book. All the special manuscripts, the notes, every single thing. It makes sense as you read and as you discover along, you find so many secrets. I also was the type of reader going, ahhh and oooh and dammn. Writing a fantasy epic like this over 800 pages, keeping top of all the orders, the names, the characters, this is no work that is rushed, but it shows a lot of hard work and dedication. I want to have this type of dedication. I can see why it took a year, it’s good! Really good. But a novel of this scale would have been proofread, redrafted, edited many many times. I would consider this. You have to read book 1 to understand the events of book 2.

I was not impressed with the way Annev made his decisions sometimes. In the novel, Annev, Titus, and Therin make their way to the Dionarchs. All I can say about the Dionarchs is that they are far worse than what Tosan and the Academy at Chalenbeau were. They are a bunch of self-hypocritical arseholes immortal beings with no sense of direction but to awake the silence of the Gods. And Reeve, who shall we say, is the leader of that presumed order, wants to use Annev as a tool. And this is where it goes worse. Annev is intelligent and realizes when he is being used, but sometimes when he turned evil, I completely disagreed with what he was doing, and there were certain acts that he did that seemed a bit off-paced. I’d have gone with some different choices to show how he transitions to that type of villain. Many times you will see him doubt, you will see him worry, and you will not like what he is becoming. I was still satisfied with the fact that he can still retain and control his thoughts. But this is all Keos’s doing. Never mind all the damn Gods in this world, Keos is like the Loki of this world. Hidden but never seen, he is not present no. But he is there. In every step of the way.

That said, I am glad that most of the characters got their own time to shine as well: Therin and Titus got their own time, and they really are fun to read. I do wish they’d find some proper girlfriends because they need them. And we got to see Crag, but I want MORE of him. He’s a fun character. Fyn and his gang of Ashes crew were brilliant, and I loved Fyn begin to mature, to question his previous behavior, and to also fall in love! I loved Sodja and the entire story that is crafted around her. I didn’t enjoy Myjun at all, because I don’t agree with what she’s doing and her prejudices, but I respect what she seeks to find out, but she should have been an Assassin from the start. What was the point of her being raised by her father if she was nothing more than turning out to be someone who does horrible actions? While I can see why the morality of this world goes awry, I would ask that at least some morality, some sense is established. Because it seems to me, the Gods of this world are eviler than anything else. All fighting each other, all doing away with each other. If I was a character I would rage and start my own religion and be free from all this chaos. This world is chaos. Slavery, thievery, all of it! This is not a fun world to be in, and it makes me sad. I want to see the characters at least get a small measure of peace.

Oh, and I thought I would never enjoy Elder Tosan again. He is such a brilliant villain that I want to see more of him. I really miss Sodar, and I want him to come back. Sodar has to stop Annev because he is the only sensible father figure that can stop Annev from becoming too evil. The story is excellent, it is large, and it is huge. There’s a lot of lore as well. There’s gore and brutality as well, there’s love, loss, hope, and misery. I didn’t like Annev becoming jealous of his friends, Therin and Titus when they stood up for him against Fyn and Kenton. Sometimes I wonder if Annev quietly contemplates using his powers to travel back into the past and change it. Would he prevent all that had happened?

This story is amazing, the worldbuilding is fantastic, the writing, description, and prose are great. I really enjoyed this. 10/10 from me!

I have submitted my Amazon and Waterstones review.

Master Artificer brings a darker tone to the Silent Gods world.

In the scope of the world that Justin Call has created Master Artificer is the big bang. As in Master of Sorrow is the spark of what the world is. But Master Artificer shows how big the world is.

In Master of Sorrow, the Story is told from Annev Point of view. Where in Master Artificer there are multiple but the main ones are Annev, Keaton and Myjun. We get to see what they get up to as they look for revenge or answers. As there are multiple plots lines going through Master Artificer, I did get a little confused in places. But by the end everything made sense.

One of my favourite aspects is the question of morality and is Annev a good person doing bad things or just a bad guy. Also how the other character justifies their actions, still believing they are doing the right thing.

Another aspect I enjoyed was the expansion of magic. That different ethnicity has a different magically system, and if you are mixed-raced knowing more than one type of magic can impact your ability.

My rating for Master Artificer is 4 out of 5.

When I read the number of pages on my Kindle I just said "UH" and thought "it will take ages to read such a long book".
I was wrong as it's a page turner and I read it quite fast.
The Master of Sorrows was a great start for a new fantasy series, this is even better.
It's darker, more complex and the world building is breath taking.
One thing I loved: there's a summary of the previous book at the beginning and this helps to remember.
I liked the darker tone and I can't wait for the next novel.
This one is strongly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC all opinions are mine

When I first read Master of Sorrows last year, it was a five-star read and easily one of my favourites debuts. I jumped at the chance to read Master Artificer the sequel, which is bigger and more audacious in every way possible. Justin Call concentrates on making the story more accessible. In this book, we get much deeper world-building, more expansive lore and magic, which builds upon the foundations of the first book.

What attracted me to these books. I wanted to witness how and why Annev turns to the dark. In Master Artificer we begin to see the tone of the story becoming much more darkling, which makes this read all the more compelling. One aspect that I enjoyed was the expansion of the world, which is done gradually, rather than massive info-dumps. The fact this book held my attention for 900 pages, is a credit to the author, a truly unputdownable book.

In Master Artificer, we see the true beginning as to how Annev’s life is headed down that dark path with many difficult decisions ahead. In my memory, this isn’t a narrative or story I have come across very often, especially a character who, on the surface starts as a good guy. That we actually get to witness this transition is what piqued my interest.

Master Artificer is three novels in one. The first part concentrates on Annev’s group, trying to do right by the world, struggling to gain knowledge and protect their own in a constant battle against those trying to destroy them. This is in the aftermath of Annev and company having survived the wrecked ruins of their home school and, in many ways, their lives from the first book Master of Sorrows. Which concentrated on Annev's coming of age. The second story is set around a returning character who forms an uneasy alliance with a group of rogues to emancipate a city reeking of corruption through any means necessary. The third story goes full-on dark in style and tone. It felt like a continuation of the epilogue of Master of Sorrows. The story takes the reader through a journey of the worlds of shadow, violence, horror and revenge, and much, much worse.

Master Artificer is about Annev's future and what it will hold. Everyone wants to either kill him or control him. At times of feels like, Annev has the devil’s luck when it comes to survival. At the same time, the people who Annev cares about are all forging paths themselves. Each one plays a part in Annev's future in some way, it was good the see this aspect unfold.

I enjoyed the detailed character building. There is plenty of storylines between these 900 pages, admittedly, there is a lot to keep track of. All of it compelling and action-packed. There is some foreshadowing and one or two surprising and unpredictable revelations that took me off guard. It was good that this happened, and wholly down to Call’s mastery of storytelling. I fell in love with the characters and the world he created. It was everything I wanted, sometimes disturbing and dramatic, sometimes violent but not unnecessarily so.

Master Artificer is really compelling story and with an epilogue that teases us for the next book Master of the Fallen. This is highly recommended and for me...Justin Call goes straight to the top of my anticipated reads for the future.

Wow! Just wow! Justin Cal is amazing. Who would have taught this book could be better than its predecessor? An amazing world and even more amazing characters. I just want to go there and stay there forever!!

If you want a meaty tome of epic fantasy, look no further. Following on from the excellent Master of Sorrows, this second volume in the series takes an even darker turn as the reader follows Annev, Fyn and Myjun through the trials and twists that await them. Call manages to hit all the required beats of epic fantasy whilst still delivering an immersive new experience in the genre told in a fresh voice. Highly recommend.

Master Artificer is the sequel to Justin Call’s 2019 coming-of-age fantasy, Master of Sorrows, a novel that I found to be a wonderfully relaxing mix of the old and the new when I first read it. I had my complaints, but for the most part it was the kind of escapist epic fantasy that I love to read. It embraced some tropes, put its own twist on others, and constantly tried to seek new ground.

And speaking of new ground, Master Artificer is left with a lot of work to do following the ending of the first book. And the result is something which I wouldn’t really describe as “relaxing”.

Where Master of Sorrows has that “coming of age” feeling to it, Master Artificer takes a turn to the grimdark. The world beyond Chaenbalu is something that’s a bit darker than our characters were prepared for, and they are forced to make some pretty brutal decisions to survive. This tone shift left me with mixed feelings. On one hand, it feels like a natural evolution from where the series was to where it is going, but on the other… I kind of missed that naive, optimistic feeling from the first book. Though I’d assume that the absence of this is a deliberate decision on Call’s part.

On the subject of the world expanding beyond Chaenbalu, this ties into one of my biggest complaints about Master Artificer. With the way the wider series has been structured, this read more like the first book in a series than the second. As a consequence of the isolated, cult-like town in book one… we know almost nothing about the wider world (and neither do the characters). And as Justin Call isn’t satisfied with relying on a generic world to move the story along, he puts in the work to build a world that is entirely his.

But for me, this is a bit of a double-edged sword. While there is now more lore, more characters, more storylines for readers to sink their teeth into… the foundations still have to be built for all of those. So there’s a lot of very opaque exposition, and a lot of our main characters acting out the “Watson” trope — asking questions on behalf of the audience so that answers can be provided directly to the readers. I know that a lot of readers love this kind of stuff, but for me, it was a bit of a frustrating experience.

By the second book of a series, I expect the story to kick into gear pretty quickly. But here, I felt like it was a little stop-start. I wanted to get on with things and lose myself in the story, but right up until the 50% mark (a significant length in an 800 page novel) I was still being educated on more lore, more characters, more quirks of the magic system. From a personal taste standpoint, I would have preferred to experience those things rather than be told about them.

Having said all that… once those foundations were built, I did enjoy myself. With the wider POV character cast, there were several aspects that I found interesting (after some growing pains). There’s a team of thieves. There’s a magic school. There’s an apprentice to an evil assassin. The whole idea of a predestined dark lord really comes to the forefront. There’s more women characters playing important roles. Admittedly, there were a few scenes that I thought passed the threshold for what I’d call “edgy”, but those come with the territory in dark fantasy.

With a chunky sequel like this, the questions will always be:
1) Will I enjoy it if I liked the first?
2) Does it feel “too long”?

My answers to those are:
1) I think so
and
2) a little bit.

The dark fantasy aspects, the POV creep, and the abundance of lore are things that you will either love or hate. And how you enjoy those will form the basis for what you feel about the length. For someone like me (who was a little burnt out on exposition), It did feel a couple hundred pages too long. I really felt the length in the first third in particular.

It feels like this review has been a bit of a downer, but I should say that I am still really excited to continue this series. Now that the foundations have been well and truly built, I’m looking forward to seeing Justin Call kick his world and characters into high gear. And hey, there are readers out there who have read this review and thought to themselves, “Dark fantasy? An abundance of lore? A dark lord as a main character? A whole bunch of my favourite tropes, and a whole bunch of pages to sink my teeth into? Yes. Give it to me.”

This book is for you guys.

This is the second book on Justin calls silent gods series and it was everything I needed it to be after reading the first book.

The first book was very informationally dense and so is book 2, this series isn’t for the faint hearted, it’s a lot of information to take on and retain and it’s all important to the story that continues in this book. I did however find The Master Artificer to be much easier to read than Master of Sorrows, everything started fitting together and things made sense where as in book one it was hard to follow as so much information was being thrown at us at such a fast pace.... it was a lot!
Master of Sorrows to me felt like a pre cursor to the story actually beginning in this book, the Master Artificer.

The master artificer has a dramatic change in pace and tone from Master of Sorrows. In this book we follow the POV of multiple characters as opposed to the first book where it’s only Annevs POV. I found this to be better, it appealed to my reading style more and I liked the change of pace from character to character. This also allows the reader to get a view of the world and multiple realms we are reading about. Calls world is massive! Keeping track of all the places and people we have met in this book is a task in itself but one I have enjoyed.

This book shifts us from a coming of age story and the makings of a hero of the Innocent Annevog de Breth, to the beginning of his decent into becoming a ‘dark hero/villain’. This was really interesting to me as it’s something I rarely see in books, it’s such a dramatic turn. I have loved reading about Annev and his evolving journey, how he has come into his own powers and how his views have shaped him. How someone who seems to be good views can change them.

One character I really loved reading about who I thought I would hate was Fyn. Iv loved his character development, going from someone who looks down on others and uses them to his advantage, to finding a place for himself, finding a group of people whom he can call ‘family’ and how he has found a solid focus on his new found quest.

The only POV I didn’t overly enjoy reading about was Kenton, I just found that he didn’t hold my interest. I understand his importance to the story but I just didn’t connect with him. I think it’s because I didn’t know if I was supposed to like him or hate him and I also found his sole focus on Myjun annoying.

The magic system is greatly expanded on in Master Artificer. As much as it’s straight forward it’s hella confusing! It took me a while to get my head round the magic system and I honestly still don’t think I have a strong grasp on it even though it’s explained well, it’s just as I said at the start of the review, there is a lot of information and processing it takes time. There are different combinations of magic types and different systems. I love how advanced it is as often I’m books it’s simple and whilst that is great this takes it to another level. The detail Call goes to in theses books is on another level. There is a reason this books is so big!

There is a guide on the magic system in this book but it’s at the back and reading this as an ebook I didn’t know if existence until I got to the end, it would have been good if it had been at the start as I probably would have referred back to it if I knew it was there.

My only wish I had for this book is that we had more of a conclusion to some of the events that are currently happening and there is a lot happening, it’s left us lots of big cliffhangers and I need answers.

I will absolutely be reading the next book when we get it.

Master Artificer is a bigger and bolder sequel in every way possible; Call has taken The Silent Gods to new heights with an explosion of lore, worldbuilding and compellingly darker characterisation.

The one thing I have to say about this sequel was that I did not expect such a dramatic shift in the tone of the story. Call's debut, Master of Sorrows, was as close to a modern take of a classic coming-of-age story as it could be. It reminded me of The Belgariad with a main protagonist that was at the centre of a prophecy involving the old gods. Except in this case, our 'hero' was supposedly destined to become the future dark lord.

This was a remarkably compelling way to modernise the typical heroic arc of classic fantasy stories. The first book of this tetralogy focussed on introducing the readers to this would-be dark lord, Ainnevog de Breth or better known as Annev, as he was in training to become an Avatar of the Academy in the hidden village of Chaenbalu. The Academy's sole purpose for existing was to locate and retrieve magical artifacts for their safekeeping. Almost a paradox for a boy whose destiny is intertwined with dark magic. Much was revealed about the Academy and its Masters as the intense climax of Master of Sorrows came about, and even more so in Master Artificer which exploded with so much worldbuilding content that my mind went into hyperdrive.

The complexity and intricacy of the narrative increased significantly as the lore and history of the world which was merely teased at before came to the forefront. The magic system is expansive, complex and well thought-out as it even evolves through time - just check out the appendix at the back of the book and you'll know what I mean - it's truly fascinating and a lot to take in. As with a world with such deep history and reverence for the gods, there were also many factions and secret groups of differing religious beliefs and agendas to keep track of. How Call kept all these together was simply astounding. I won't even attempt to explain or summarise it in my own words as it will only be an epic fail on my part. After all, Call spent over 15 years developing its mythology, I'm just a mere passenger on this wondrous journey and adventure through a new and intricate world.

With the sheer amount of worldbuilding required to really get into the meat of things, it becomes apparent that Call had to perform a difficult balancing act in this sequel. On top of that, the character viewpoints also increased from the sole perspective of Annev to several others, which explained why this sequel is a much bigger book. As much as I delighted in discovering more about the world, the introduction of the additional viewpoint characters did take me a while to feel engaged and invested in their stories. Fortunately, these were not new characters but those we've already met in the first book, so at least I knew them and their relevance to Annev's story.

Two of these viewpoints, Kenton and Myjun, were the antagonists to Annev's arc. While I wouldn't exactly call it a problem, I had a hard time getting into their chapters due to two reasons. Firstly, I didn't like them and secondly, there's so much darkness in their arcs which were filled with so much rage, hatred and pain as both of them had to deal with the consequences of their actions. Make no mistake though, I do recognise and appreciate that having their viewpoints adds to the richness of the overall story even though I didn't enjoy it half as much as I did for the others.

Speaking of the other viewpoints, Annev's development was of course the highlight of the book. I'm probably not the only reader of the first book to think that Annev doesn't seem to embody much "dark lord-ness" in him. Well, let's just that Master Artificer made a very compelling argument that sometimes it doesn't take an evil person to do dark things all in the name of stopping those who hurt the ones you love. In short, Annev's character arc became even more riveting as he gradually comes to his own in wielding his own brand of unorthodox magic, and the series has taken a turn to become really, really dark. Let me just put it out there that this book contained some very disturbing scenes.

Master Artificer is a big book, and content wise it seemed even bigger because of the incredible amount of exposition and character development in it. Here we come to the crux of my only real gripe and that there wasn't any solid plot resolution at the end of so many pages. It felt like a transitional book that was building the foundations of the story that is to come, and one should be prepared to treat it as such. I believe if I knew about this going into the book, I might be able to enjoy it more and just take the time to absorb all that it did have to offer, which was a lot.

I have to commend Call for his audacity in writing such a bold sequel with its dramatic shift in narrative tone, and in so deftly handling the exposition of such complex and intricate worldbuilding. I'm definitely all-in for the ride as The Silent Gods has all the makings and promise of something extraordinary.