UptownOracle in Book Reviews

Uptown Oracle Reads… Ashlords

Ashlords
Scott Reintgen

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Every year since the Ashlords were gifted phoenix horses by their gods, they’ve raced them. First into battle, then on great hunts, and finally for the pure sport of seeing who rode the fastest. Centuries of blood and fire carved their competition into a more modern spectacle: The Races.

Over the course of a multi-day event, elite riders from clashing cultures vie to be crowned champion. But the modern version of the sport requires more than good riding. Competitors must be skilled at creating and controlling phoenix horses made of ash and alchemy, which are summoned back to life each sunrise with uniquely crafted powers to cover impossible distances and challenges before bursting into flames at sunset. But good alchemy only matters if a rider knows how to defend their phoenix horse at night. Murder is outlawed, but breaking bones and poisoning ashes? That’s all legal and encouraged.

In this year’s Races, eleven riders will compete, but three of them have more to lose than the rest–a champion’s daughter, a scholarship entrant, and a revolutionary’s son. Who will attain their own dream of glory? Or will they all flame out in defeat?

The first thing I want to talk about is how much I loved the phoenixes in this book. Instead of birds, the phoenixes are horse shaped, and there’s an alchemy element which changes their attributes every day. They also die every single day when the sun goes down and rise in the morning from their ashes. All of these aspects give this book a unique take on the phoenix mythology in this world.

The race itself is kind of okay. For some reason I kept thinking of The Hunger Games because of the set up, but the racers met each other a lot less throughout. Plus it is genuinely a race, whilst the riders can attack each other to get ahead – they can’t murder each other and most of the day is spent riding their phoenixes as fast as possible.

Most of the action seemed to happen at night when they weren’t racing. This meant you either had the action and fights or you had the phoenixes but rarely both which I found disapointing. You defintely go into the book expecting lots of phoenix horse content, but most of the exciting parts of the book aren’t with them.

Ashlords has three POV’s and we start with Imelda. From the outset she is the most interesting but her storyline isn’t linked that much with Adrian and Pippa in this book. I do think they will intertwine more in the next book though.

Imelda is a Dividian which are a lower class in this world, and her story starts off with her wanting to prove Dividians can be riders. Throughout the book she begins to understand the complete disregard that Ashlords have for Dividians, and so she develops into more of a rebel who wants to show up the race. This storyline starts off strong and also grows on you as it develops, and it makes you want to know what will happen.

Adrian is a Longhand which is a offshoot from the Ashlords ancestors and who have their own land. Ashlords still look down on them the same as Dividians, but have less control over them. The world building around Ashlords, Dividians, and Longhands is very distinct and I think it gives a lot of motivation and thought process to each of the characters.

Because of this, Adrian’s father is trying to create a rebellion which will allow them to separate from the Ashlords for good, pulling Adrian into his plans. Adrian is in the race to encourage rebellion once he wins the race. To be honest, I don’t understand why he had to be in the race for this rebellion to start properly, but I did like him as a character so I’m not too bothered. He’s extremely clever but also quite naive when it comes to his family – I think he’s going to go through lots of decisions in the next book that will be hard for him.

Our final POV is Pippa who is the child of two Ashlords who’ve previously won the race. Pippa is like the living personification of the Horse Girl you knew at school. Despite her determination to win, she’s naive and is betrayed early on in the races which forces her to grow very quickly as a person. Her POV is also told in second person which is different to the others, and I hope this was done for a yet untold reason.

Each of our characters is forced to grow in the book, especially as they were very naive at the start about different things. I liked that each of them had this development and it felt like a natural progression as they learned and experienced new things.

Other characters that appear are Gods and spirits. Gods live in the Underworld but they like to appear and get involved in human games now and then. I loved that this is somehow a huge secrets for the Ashlords that gods give boons to the racers, however I would have liked to see more of the Gods throughout the book. I’m hoping this might be a bigger part of the second book, and this was just hints for the world building.

The gifts given are most often in the shape of spirits who can help their rider, and the spirits do this in order to be free of the underworld. Pippa has a spirit and she really helps Pippa get through the race. I also believe this may be why her POV is second person… I’m not sure if it would have the same emphasis otherwise.

Overall, I found the book to be quick and easy to read and everything is very straigthforward. Ashlords focuses on the races, but it’s defintely heading into rebellion territory like The Hunger Games for the next book. Unfortunately, I liked this book as more of a standalone and I’m not that interested in the next one as it will most likely include rebellions and romantic sub-plots I’m not interested in.