After defying death at the hands of the Cielcin, Hadrian Marlowe is now known as the Halfmortal and has become a bit of a legend within the Sollan Empire. His prominence has also amassed him quite a few enemies who feel that he is a threat to the throne, and he must now worry that the Emperor himself could be one of them. To make matters worse, the Cielcin have also upped their game and they now have a new leader known as the Scourge of Earth. This new leader is a lot more strategic and that has turned the tide of the war in the favor of the Cielcin. Despite all of those threats to Hadrian, what really grabbed me about this book was related to the "ancient" alien race known as the Quiet. Although some of the new revelations will make your brain hurt at times, for me the Quiet have now gone from a slightly boring thread in the series to a very interesting one. 

This series is definitely epic in scope and it has been gaining momentum over time, but I am also concerned that it is moving along rather slowly. There are multiple events that have been foretold from the beginning that still haven't happened yet, and looking at the author's website you can see that this series is planned to be seven books in total. That means we aren't even at the halfway point yet so I hope Christopher Ruocchio can keep up the momentum he is building so far. With the developments in this book I am reminded a bit of the series Hyperion and the Quiet have piqued my interest in a similar way to Hyperion's time tombs. Good stuff.

Samuel Roukin is an excellent narrator for this series and at this point he has become the voice of Hadrian Marlowe.