Welcome to my stop on the We Ride the Storm blog tour, in which We Review the Book. Long text is long, sorry not sorry.

This was my second read-through of We Ride the Storm by Devin Madson, I initially read the self-published version last year. So this review is going to be broken into two parts, (1) general thoughts about the book and (2) why you should read this version before picking up We Lie with Death.

The blurb

War built the Kisian Empire and war will tear it down. And as an empire falls, three warriors rise.

Caught in a foreign war, Captain Rah e’Torin and his exiled warriors will have to fight or die. Their honour code is all they have left until orders from within stress them to breaking point, and the very bonds that hold them together will be ripped apart.

Cassandra wants the voice in her head to go away. Willing to do anything for peace, the ageing whore takes an assassination contract that promises answers, only the true price may be everyone and everything she knows.

A prisoner in her own castle, Princess Miko doesn’t dream of freedom but of the power to fight for her empire. As the daughter of a traitor the path to redemption could as easily tear it, and her family, asunder.

As an empire dies they will have to ride the storm or drown in its blood.

The fact that I read this book twice in one year should be a pretty good indicator that I really loved it. It’s a lot darker than what I usually read, it’s not quite a grimdark, I think, but there is a lot of beheading going on all over the place (and one CW for rape). I wouldn’t say everyone’s an asshole here, because their intentions are in a way good, but everyone’s willing to walk over corpses to get their goals. Many corpses.

General thoughts

A lot of this section of the review is pretty much the same as what I said last year, with it being the same book and all.

There are 3 point-of-view characters, Rah the young leader of a group of nomad warriors, Cassandra a prostitute and an assassin who hears a voice in her head, and Miko the ambitious young princess. Each chapter follows one of them, which is interesting as we get to see both sides of a brewing war. I really loved how well the 3 perspectives worked together to form a full story. I like how hints, mentions of names, become useful soon enough for me to still remember them, how pieces fall together to form a big picture, the worldbuilding trickles in.

Devin Madson kills it with opening lines. I’ve tried to pick a favorite between the Orbit published version one “They tried to kill me four times before I could walk.” and the one in the self-pub version “It’s harder to sever a head than people think.”,  but I really can’t. Right from the start you know this book means business.

If I had to pick a favorite it would be Cassandra, but all three main characters were great and towards the end, I loved Miko more than Cass.

Rah is young and still naive in many ways, always tries to do what’s right according to his people’s traditions but he sees things pretty black and white and can’t deal with the idea of compromising those traditions. At all.  He’s the most altruistic of the lot, usually doing what he thinks is best for his people, but fails to take into account what they want and think.

Miko is fierce, she made me go “hell yeah!” the most. She also starts young and naive but deals much better with disillusionment. Where Rah always clings to his rigid world view, she’s very flexible in her thoughts. She’s constantly dismissed and finding out there was a lot she didn’t know, but she thinks fast. She’s got a good mix of wanting power for herself and thinking of the interest of her people, though she leans more towards the power, when you compare her to some of the other politicians involved she’s a saint. There’s a recurring theme for her that the world changes in an instant but she’s great at thinking on her feet in that moment, playing the long game.

Cassandra is great. She’s the veteran, been at this for a while, knows her shit. But still, she gets dragged into a plot way over her head. I think the voice in her head really helps, because of the way She criticizes her, it makes her seem less jaded, I normally hate the jaded seen it all done it all know it all assassin type, and she’s not like that. Cassandra wants to always only look out for herself but ends up softening slightly here and there, but ultimately a whoressassin’s gotta do what a whoressassin’s gotta do.

I also listened to the audiobook for a bit, because it has 3 actors and I was curious about them. They nailed it, every one of them is great, and I could listen to my bae Cassandra forever.

The setting is all about cultures clashing. There’s the Kisian Empire that’s all about tradition and bloodlines and high-level politics. They’re so focussed on their succession and court intrigue they don’t even notice the coming threat. The Chilteans are an empire expanding, they’ve got strict hierarchy with the head of their monotheistic church at the top and legions of soldiers. We don’t learn very much about their functioning other than there is plenty of backstabbing to go around. The Levanti are a horse riding nomad people with strange beheading traditions and a very strict code of honor. There have always been border tensions between the Chilteans and Kisians, and the story in this book has shit getting real.

There’s not a lot of magic or fantastical elements, it’s pretty much all humans here, with a few individuals that show mysterious and powerful magic, that will probably be further explained in the series.

I really liked the writing, I highlighted so many passages that I thought were either smart or funny or wise. Especially in Miko’s perspective, I liked the recurring theme of the world changing in an instant.

We Ride The Storm is part of a series, but it sort of both ends on a cliffhanger and is a complete story in itself. One stage ends another will begin for each of our main characters, I want to read the next one but I felt this one did have a conclusion.

Why you should read this version, even if you read the old version

OMG this book was so intense on a reread. Knowing in advance how bad some things go, how monumental some of these fuck ups will be, creates some much tension. I kept having to put the book down and go nononononono. There was much screaming at characters.

Just the way this story is built makes it excellent on a reread. First time I read it was like pieces coming together to form a puzzle, and now it was great looking at the entire image and seeing how it fits.

There are three extra chapters and a lot of added details and scenes. I think they really helped show even more detail to the characters. I felt like I understood Rah better this time around, Leo definitely made more of an impression, and I loved the sort of banter between Cassandra and Her (though I can’t remember how much of that was new, it might have all been there first time too). I also got the sense there was more context provided for the Levanti. I could be wrong ofc, I didn’t actually go back and check, and my memory is not great, but while reading I often got a sense of “oh, this is new” .

Last time I reviewed this I ended with some of the notes I’d taken, and to end this review on a similar note of eloquivesience I can summarise with AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA this book is great.

Character cards copied with permission from Devin Madson’s twitter

Doggo was less than impressed with my woeness at having finished this book and having to wait till next year for book 2.