Book Review: Voice of War by Zack Argyle

Chrys Valerian has been given a task, to scout out bring to justice a group kidnapping and stealing threadweaver blood. As more and more threadweavers (those who can use threadlight to push or pull energies to their physical advantage) go missing the task becomes increasingly dire. During his investigations he comes across Laurel, a rebellious teen from the Fairenwild who has been captured by the blood thieves. Without thanks for him or his team she breaks free from the thieves and Chrys before he can question her further.

During his time on the hunt, Chrys discovers more than he bargained for and must get to his superiors before it is too late. Lines are crossed and not only does he need to worry about his own safety, but that of his wife and unborn child; all the while holding back the apogee inside his head, begging for release, to unleash devastation once more.

Underlying the initial plot is a richer history of threadweaving which has been largely hidden from our main character. He discovers that the Sapphires and Emeralds are not the only ones to wield the light. A lesson that becomes all the more important as his newborn son’s eyes are opened for the first time, shining a yellowy amber rather than green or blue. A colour he has only seen once before, in a creature who wished him dead.

Chrys and family are forced to flee to save their son and discover more about their past than is good for them. Laurel’s and Chrys’s stories intertwine in a clash of chromowolves and bloodlust.

One more character worth mentioning is Alvarax, he plays a darker more sinister role having to make some hard decisions due to the situations he is placed in. I don’t want to say too much about this character arc due to spoilers, but it is safe to say, he is one I want to watch in the coming books. 

A few standouts for me here was the magic system, worldbuilding and scope of characters. The magic system was simple enough to understand yet complex enough to continue building throughout the story. As the reader learned more about how threadlight worked the magic system became more and more layered with abilities and restrictions. We got to discover how different abilities could work together while simultaneously working against another type of threadlight.

The world, while we only see a small part of it was rich and vivid, the lush territories of the Fairenwild coupled with the cities of the grounders make this story feel alive. I was also very impressed at the scope of the characters introduced in this book, and even those who did not have a huge part to play left some impact on the story overall. There were characters who we saw in the beginning that didn’t come into play again until much later in the story but were still linked in a way that I was not scratching my head to figure out where they came from.

One last note, I listened to this book on audible and the narration of Adam Gold was outstanding. Normally the narrator and make or break a book for me but Gold absolutely nailed bringing this world to live in his performance (IMO).

I had a great time with Voice of war and am looking forward to the next two books!

Voice of war was a thrilling debut full of action, adventure and a great deal of heart wrapped up neatly in 380 pages.