Source: DRC via NetGalley (Orbit, Orbit Books) in exchange for an honest review
Publication Date: July 25, 2023
Synopsis: Goodreads
Purchase Link: Amazon

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Why did I choose to read this book?

I enjoy fantasy novels that work with races that are not just human (i.e. LOTR) and I always like to try to support debut authors.

What is this book about?

This is an excellent question that, 26% of the way into the ebook, I still cannot answer. There are obviously power structures and social castes but there was also a revolution at some point but there’s still a king that some people want to overthrow, and others sit on a mine of extremely rare ore and are happy to remain rich and apart. There are gods that people worship and others they call demons (a very close relative of Catholicism I think?) and there is a magic system that uses metals and ore as its fuel. There is a lot going on in this book, so much that what it is about, what it’s seeking to say or do is lost in the shuffle. It’s just characters doing things without anything really going anywhere.

What is notable about this story?

The magic system Geomancia is pretty neat. It’s okay to use in some areas and forbidden in others. There are clear costs to using it, but it seems that anyone could learn to use it if they were taught how. Those with the access to the different ore types have the most magic, which also creates division between the various groups.

Was anything not so great?

This debut has a lot of good ideas that get lost in an inconsistent writing style and jumbled themes. There is simply too much going on without enough information about why these things are happening. A rule I try to follow for most of my DRCs is to give them a chance until I hit the 30% mark, and I couldn’t do that for The Sun and the Void. I had to stop at 26% because (1) I didn’t care about the characters and (2) I didn’t understand or care what was happening to them.

I do want to make a quick note here that I got the sense that this book wasn’t written for me. There is a lot of symbolism and mythology here that might make this story overly inaccessible for someone with my lens, while others may read it and recognize everything they experienced. I don’t want to sell myself short here though, I pride myself in reading widely and diversely – but this book just completely lost me.

What’s the verdict?

On Goodreads I’m going to give this one the benefit of the doubt rating of 2 stars and shelve it on my DNF list. It’s a garbled story with too many things going on at once without any of them being clarified to guide the reader through. If it sounds interesting to you after reading the synopsis (linked above) I would say request it at your local library and give it a try before you buy – you might connect with this one better than I did. At this point though, I just had to give myself permission to put this one down.