Fortune's Wake by C. L. Clark

Blurb:

The Witcher series meets RJ Barker's The Bone Ships and Nicola Griffith's Spear in this standalone dark fantasy novella about a failed monster-hunter, from the award-nominated author of The Unbroken, Ambessa: Chosen of the Wolf, Fate's Bane and more.

Kill the beast.

Earn some coin.

Get the girl.

Or at least, that's how it was supposed to go. Kova of Stormwatch made a promise when she left her mother and sweetheart weeping on the shore back home: she'd earn her fortune slaying the beasts that haunt the woods and the horrors that lurk in the shadows, or she would die trying. But to do that, she needs an apprenticeship with a master monster hunter. The best of the best: Sayre Boarbane.

Pity that Sayre works alone.

When Sayre drags Kova home by the ear, they're both in for a rude awakening. Kova's mother? Missing. Kova's lover? Taking long walks on the beach with a stranger.

And all those monsters Kova wanted to slay? They're back in Stormwatch, dragging villagers into the ocean.

Spoiler Filled Review:

Fortune’s Wake is a dark, moody story of vengeance that takes the reader into the depths of haunted crypts filled with eerie monsters and deadly magics. Fortune’s Wake is a fast-paced, stand-alone novella that is centered around Kova of Stormwatch, a young woman with a difficult past, who had left all that she knew and loved to seek her fortune on the open sea while trying to become the apprentice of the famed monster-hunter: Sayre. She returns to her seaside village of Stormwatch as a failure. She’s made no fortune. Sayre has refused to mentor her. Her lover has found her way into the arms of another. And her drunkard mother is nowhere to be found. After the town is attacked by a group of undead, mythological monsters, Kova is thrown into the fray and forced to investigate not only what happened to her mother, but where these monsters are coming from. 

While this novella is a quick read, Clark is able to infuse a good deal of worldbuilding and suspense into the pages. For me, some of the strongest aspects of this story are the creative and interesting monsters that kova and her team meet along the journey. The dretch, which are the initial undead creatures that rise from the depths of the ocean and attack Stormwatch, were standouts for me. The undead bodies of sailors who drowned at sea and were never appropriately laid to rest, they’re creepy and deadly and perfect for setting the tone for the high stakes of the novella. In the final showdown cavern of the Salt Crypts, the floor is littered with large craterous pools with deadly tentacled arms that will burst from the surface of the water if it is disturbed and blindly kill anything that they’re able to grasp. It reminded me of some of the creatures from The Mist by Stephen King. These deadly pools become expertly wielded weapons as Kova attempts to disturb the water at just the right moments to induce chaos and destruction among the traitors who have betrayed Stormwatch and taken her mother.

While I loved the monsters and the hunt through the Salt Crypts, I did find myself questioning why different characters were making the choices that they were making. Some of this has to do with the short form of the story. It’s harder to firmly establish character motivations and intents in a short novella compared to a novel or longer series. However, I felt like much of the motivation for why Willa had taken and killed Kova’s mother, why she had turned on the people of Stormwatch, and why she had kept Ta’aliya in the dark eluded me. But despite this, Fortune’s Wake was a well written, fast-paced monster hunter story that kept me interested and reading to the very last page.