Rob J. Hayes

Ein is on a mission from God. A God of Death. Time is up for the Emperor of Ten Kings and it falls to a murdered eight year old boy to render the judgement of a God. Ein knows he can't do it alone, but the empire is rife with heroes. The only problem; in order to serve, they must first die. Ein has four legendary heroes in mind, names from story books read to him by his father. Now he must find them and kill them, so he can bring them back to fight the Reaper's war.

Never Die

C. J. Daley 

I was gifted a copy of the audiobook narrated by Kim Bretton to judge for the Indie Ink Awards for Best Audio Narration. Sad I don’t own it now because the cover is too damn good. 

This was amazing. You get sucked right into a world utterly different from ours. It makes you want to know more and more. It’s transformative with action that lights up visually. The world is very Asian inspired. Kind of like ‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’-esque with the action styling. But with vengeful reanimated spirits throughout! 

The author does a great job with a group of completely different characters. They do learn and grow, but they are also so definitely themselves through the story. My favorite is ‘The Whispering Blade’, Itami Cho. Her character has personality and purpose and she was such a cool fighter. 

The narration is absolutely top notch. The narrator’s accent and voices are perfect for the distinct characters she’s bringing to life. You can tell who’s talking right by the voice she’s doing and that’s pretty unique. I would 10/10 recommend going the audio route.

Personally a 5/5*. I need more. And again, I’m really loving this new age run of short fantasy books!

Hmm...the description raised my hopes and the book crushed them. For being advertised as a wild adventure, following a group of samurai, shinigami, and heroes, the book is remarkably dry and slow. 

Nickie Mohler

I was sent an ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review. 
I have had Rob J. Hayes on my TBR for quite a while now. I have a kindle, but much prefer physical books. I think that is the only reason I haven't read any of his stuff until now. When offered an ARC, I decided to finally check his writing out. I was not disappointed.

This story follows eight year old Ein on a mission to kill the emperor. To do this, he has been granted the power to bring warriors and heroes back from the dead to aid him. He already knows who he'll raise from the dead. They are heroes from the stories his father used to read to him. Now they have to die so he can bring them back to life. It's the only way to kill the emperor.

I really enjoyed this. The characters are so different from each other. I loved how they started off strangers and grew to be a team and a dysfunctional sort of family. They each have their own kind of magic that was interesting. I loved some of the names they gave each other. 

I liked this book so much that I have already bought physical copies of his first 2 series! Highly recommend for all fantasy readers.

Alexia Cambaling

I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.

Never Die is the story of heroes and anti-heroes given the chance to become heroes. It begs the question of what heroism truly means and what it takes to be a hero. Can an amoral bandit who cared for little save himself (and his boss’ daughter) become a hero? Can a warrior who struggled to keep her oaths be one? And yet, there are those for whom the question can be grayer. Heroes who may have to compromise their long-held principles and convictions such as the strategist who lead her prince to countless victories and the master warrior who strove never to kill.

The notion of life and death is a prominent one in this book. Here, heroes were raised from the dead by a little boy and given a quest: kill the Emperor of Ten Kings. Success meant that they will be fully restored to life while failure meant a permanent death. These are high stakes for each of the heroes and all of them wanted this mission to succeed. Of course, that didn’t mean adapting to their new half-lives was easy.

At its core, the best part about this book were the characters. There’s a good variety of them and while I wouldn’t say they come from all walks of life, they certainly carry quite different moral convictions and principles. To me, they are the heart of this novel. From the warrior Itami Cho, the warrior, to The Emerald Wind, and even Roi Astara, the leper, the characters shine through in this book. They all have their own goals to accomplish and in some cases, they conflict with one another.

I liked the world-building well enough. It’s set in a clearly East Asian-inspired world with all the trappings and terminologies of one. For each character, there are even nicknames which represent their style of fighting such as the Flaming Fist, Iron Gut, The Whispering Blade, The Emerald Wind, and even Death’s Echo. There’s also a bit of a sense of history with how the Emperor of Ten Kings was able to rise to power. It serves the story well enough and does not overshadow it.

It is a grimdark fantasy but it has the moments of hope, joy, and humanity that I most enjoy when I read grimdark. It has friendships, relationships, and a lot of character development. While it has yokai and gods, it remains fairly low-fantasy with regards to magic.

I also enjoyed the plot. It isn’t as straightforward as it originally seems to be. Yes, there’s a quest but there are also lies and secrets woven beneath it. Not everything is quite what it appears to be and the ending came as a shock to me. It does make sense in that there was foreshadowing in parts of the book but to learn the full scope of what was going on was incredible. In a sense, it is a stark reminder that heroes can be pawns to a game much bigger than themselves and what they might have thought it to be.

Overall, Never Die is a very enjoyable heroic fantasy which I can recommend to anyone who is a fan of the genre. I have enjoyed the author’s previous works before and I admire how different and fresh Never Die seemed from his previous books.

This review is also on  The Bookworm Daydreamer

Never Die

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