Skysworn by Katee Stein
Blurb:
Every Choice Holds Consequence.
As earthbound creatures surge into the Central Mercurial for the first time in an age, Tehran is caught between old responsibilities and his new reality. Haunted by Knox’s last plea for him to find the Sky, Tehran conceals his forsaken oaths in hopes his lies won’t become liabilities.
Emilia’s efforts to unravel enemy technology bring her face-to-face with the forces she is desperate to dismantle. Now truly alone, she must confront her demons and fight the monsters undermining the Order to avoid becoming their puppet.
Meanwhile, a world away, Knox awakes with new power pumping through his veins and fresh purpose driving him forward. Old bonds are loosed as he fights to reclaim the soul of the Reaches and find his way home to the child whose future is his to protect.
Review:
How do I start this review? For those who’ve not yet read book one, my review for it is linked here, and you should read “Earthbound” asap. If you’re still here before reading either the review or the book, here’s a quick recap of book one:
“Knox gets swallowed by an earth critter, everyone thinks he’s dead, so his wife and his best friend go to the main hub of the Acumen, Overseers and Elders to figure out what to do next. On their way there, Emilia, Knox’s wife, falls for Tehran, his best friend. Love triangle shenanigans would’ve happened if Knox was still alive. Which he is, but he has absolutely no clue where he is and all he knows is that people don’t like Overseers. So, while he’s being tormented by them, Tehran is searching for clues about why there was an earth critter and discovers a conspiracy. And Emilia is trying to help. The book ends with Knox in a firepit, yelling at Tehran and Emilia to GTFO of the place he’s stuck in.”
Now why is Knox in a firepit, and how did Emilia and Tehran find him? That is a question for book one to answer.
We are here for book two, where book one ends. Not heading down, but up. Anyways, yes, Skysworn is the conclusion to Earthbound. And there’s a lot happening, a lot more than book one.
If I had to sell this to someone who’s read the first novel but was on the fence about this one, I’d give them this:
“Knox should be dead, but he isn’t. Meanwhile, Tehran & Emilia are torn over the loss of their friend, and their paths split. Shenanigans abound.”,
and knowing full well that isn’t all, continue with everything else. For a book that is 500 pages, there’s seemingly 200 tacked on with everything that takes place.
To start off, we have Knox, Tehran, and Emilia. Knox is a stubborn man, who is really protective of a kid by the name of Kipp. She’s important, and I’ll talk more about her later. Tehran is torn between the loss of his oaths and his love for Emilia. Emilia doesn’t want to cause Tehran more pain, but because she can’t really get through to him, she leaves and gets spirited away (*cough cough kidnapped cough cough*). With Knox, he learns to let go of his past love for Emilia, and becomes a father figure for Kipp, who can also use the power of the Sky. Throughout the novel, he’s trying to come to terms with his new powers and responsibilities. Meanwhile, Tehran is trying to cope with his lost oaths by jumping into the fire of war pretending to still have the powers he lost. So on his side, he’s trying to learn better coping mechanisms. Aside from all that, Emilia is learning just how self sufficient she can be in the dark cell that she got put in by the traitor mentioned in book one. For her, the novel is all about survival and putting up with suffering in order to get what she wants, and that no one is as they seem.
After that, there’s the plot. Oh man, what a plot it is. First of all, there’s three subplots that all interweave into a whole. Second of all, there’s also a fourth that goes nowhere because well, the villain of the story is driving that one. His plotting works out well, until it doesn’t. The other three plots follow Knox, with his giant club cracking skulls trying to figure out where a kid is and who is working with the Raiders. Meanwhile Emilia is there, static more or less, in one spot, being used as a science experiment, while also using her technological know-how to signal to the outside world that she is fine (she is not) and she knows who the villain is. And Tehran is the clueless one who suspects something but can’t prove it. Like Knox in the last book, he’s barely there in this one, however, towards the end, he plays a pivotal role. Shenanigans abound, and the book ends on a cliffhanger with the hint of another series but this time with the kid that was playing hide n’ seek with Knox.
Lastly there’s the world building. So, if you’ve read book one, you know the Sky can grant powers of strength, speed and healing so long as you uphold an oath. The earth only takes. It gives power at the cost of the wielder. Aside from that, see book one or review one for the rest of the world building. It’s amazing.
However, the only thing I’d have to poke at about this book is that Tehran’s survivability is entirely up to the shenanigans of unseen pages. But that’s my own opinion, and if you’d like to build your own, go check the novel out.
If you like a different field of fantasy and science fiction, with something unique tying it all together, this series is for you.
As always, thank you for reading this review, and I hope I’ve helped nudge you towards your next read, or have added another novel to your TBR list. If not, don’t fret, we here on SFF Insiders have a plethora of novels in all genres reviewed that are amazing reads. Over here is a link to a random review on the site. Maybe it’s in the same genre as “Skysworn”, maybe it’s somewhere completely different.
