One Last Prayer by Mosha Winter

Blurb:

HAVE THE GODS ABANDONED US?

As doom descends on the enlightened city of Aranya, Priestess Ismena fights to keep her family and flock’s innocence. She knows not whether they will survive what is coming, but vows through this great test of faith to remain steadfast.

Denrik of the Silver Cloaks, on the other hand, is unafraid. Under the hallowed rule of his imperial masters, he knows that naught can befall the city and realm, even as the light of day is blotted out by the abomination in the sky.

Serena, daughter and heir to an ambitious family, is not nearly so staunch in her belief. For all her cynicism, though, even she cannot anticipate the hellish depths her kin might plunge to in the pursuit of survival.

Beneath the shadow of apocalypse, humanity faces its ultimate test. For when the gods are silent and the end is nigh, who can keep their faith on high?

From the #1 best selling and award winning author of The Tapestry of the Tarnished comes this prelude novella, set nearly 4,000 years prior to the events of The Winds of War.

A note on reading order:

One Last Prayer is written such that it can be read either before or after The Winds of War. Those who have read Winds will experience this story with a unique knowledge of its implications. Those who read the novella first will be left wondering what comes next, and will then have Winds to look forward to. Both approaches are entirely valid!

Review:

Here begins my much too late entry into Mosha Winter’s Tapestry of the Tarnished series. Boy did One Last Prayer make me feel silly for taking so long. 

We start off following Ismena in this action-packed, fast-paced novella, taking place nearly 4000 years before the content of book one in the series. Ismena is a priestess to one of Aranya’s many gods, caught up in the struggle of her followers, and the questions of her faith. The common folk like to say the gods are dead and dying, but Ismena refuses to acknowledge any such thing. So too do we follow Denrik, guard to the city’s rulers, unwavering in his devotion that they, despite any supposed disappearance of the gods, will save them. And of course we have Serena, my favorite of the POVs, a nobleman’s daughter, and a little shit to boot (aren’t they all?).

A massive, mountainous landmass steadily descends on the city, threatening to destroy it and all that live there. One thing I love about epic fantasy is a subversion of anticipation. You see this catastrophe and automatically assume you’ll be following the POVs of those meant to save the world from it. Not in One Last Prayer. For all their positions might suggest, these three POVs are effectively powerless against the impending doom, a sincere refresher from POVs of chosen ones. Mosha Winter shows that any one can be a hero, no matter how grand their deeds or lofty their ideals, from priests to guards, to even faithful hounds.

I risk spoiling things already, so I’ll stop with my summation. The story itself takes off from the getgo, immersing you in a world rich in lore and worldbuilding, that very clearly feels lived in. This is one of those “sink or swim” stories, so buckle up (it's worth it, I promise). I especially liked the atmosphere built around Ismena’s church, which was masterfully done. The setting, too, leaves me asking for more, and I find myself curious to see how much the world has changed in the 4000 years between One Last Prayer and the Winds of War, or if we’ll see a prelude novella like this again. Winds of War had already been on my TBR for quite some time, but One Last Prayer moved it up considerably.

As you may have guessed from me calling Serena a little shit, she is my favorite of the 3 POVs. Snarky, crass, disrespectful to anyone beneath her station, she is an almost breath of fresh air against two other noble, honorable POVs. I want to say that I have no qualms with noble or honorable, but seeing (and understanding) how a child can be made to ridicule, blame, and hate the common folk at so young an age, so believably, really stole the show for me here. If you want to understand what I’m taking about, then, of course, you need only read the book.

I would like to thank Mosha for giving me the opportunity to beta read One Last Prayer, I really appreciate it, and I feel honored, almost, at being given a behind the scenes peek at what will assuredly be a smash hit when it hits the shelves. For fans of gritty, epic fantasy, One Last Prayer by Mosha Winter that packs a considerable punch in so few pages, and is NOT a book you’ll want to miss.