May 23 2026

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Book Review: Disquiet Gods by Christopher Ruocchio

Title: Disquiet Gods

Author: Christopher Ruocchio

Series: Sun Eater #6

Genre: Science Fiction

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

The Overview: The end is nigh. It has been nearly two hundred years since Hadrian Marlowe assaulted the person of the Emperor and walked away from war. From his Empire. His duty. From the will and service of the eldritch being known only as the Quiet. The galaxy lies in the grip of a terrible plague, and worse, the Cielcin have overrun the realms of men. A messenger has come to Jadd, bearing a summons from the Sollan Emperor for the one-time hero. A summons, a pardon, and a plea. HAPSIS, the Emperor’s secret first-contact intelligence organization, has located one of the dreadful Watchers, the immense, powerful beings worshipped by the Pale Cielcin. Called out of retirement and exile, the old hero—accompanied by his daughter, Cassandra—must race across the galaxy and against time to accomplish one last, impossible: To kill a god. –Goodreads

The Review:

It took me FOREVER to get through this book. Over a year with a couple of soft DNFs in the mix. I don’t think it was solely the book’s fault, but I finished almost 80 books in that same timeframe, so it wasn’t solely me, either. There was this one part about 30% of the way in where my eyes started to glaze over both times I tried to read it. Once I got past that, I enjoyed myself quite a bit… but it took a while.

At this point in the series, I would definitely say I’m invested to see how it ends. Despite my troubles I actually liked a lot of the stuff in this book. An addition of a new character being my favorite highlight. And actually I like all the characters. They’re all wildly interesting profiles to me, which is perhaps one of the main reasons I kept coming back.

I also still appreciate the writing style. It’s distinctive in its flowing nature and often lyrical delivery. It reminds me a lot of the introspection you get during those interludes in a Drizzt book. The writing is so good it makes it easier to ignore the repetition and generally overindulgent musings. Somehow they always feel like they need to be there even though the points have long been driven home.

Even with all of that, I have to say I didn’t love the plot of this one. It bounced from one thing to the next in a way that was jarring, the subject change so abrupt. Several times throughout the book we were suddenly dealing with something drastically different, sometimes with only a couple of pages of transition. It made it feel very hodgepodge. Like a cleanup novel where the author was scrambling to tie up all the loose ends so that he could launch into the next finale book.

Even though this book wasn’t the strongest of the bunch, I’m still happy to have read all the books to this point and overall have had a great time with the series. I am earnestly looking forward to the final book of the series!

Recommendations: Interesting characters, absorbing writing, wild scifi adventures – this is a series well worth a try if you haven’t already.

Thank you to my Patrons: Dave, Katrin, Frank, Jen, Karen, Sonja, Staci, Kat, Betsy, Eliss, Mike, Elizabeth, Bee, Poochtee, Kinsey, Alysa, Derek, Kelly, Grace, and Carmen! <3

Other books you might like:

by Niki Hawkes

May 15 2024

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Mini Book Review: The Lesser Devil by Christopher Ruocchio

Title: The Lesser Devil

Author: Christopher Ruocchio

Series: Sun Eater #1.5

Genre: Science Fiction

Rating: 2/5 stars

The Overview: CAN THE YOUNGEST SON OF A NOBLE HOUSE SAVE HIS FAMILY FROM A PLOT GENERATIONS IN THE MAKING? Crispin Marlowe grew up in his brother’s shadow, but Hadrian is gone, and his grandmother—the duchess of Delos—is dying. Answering her summons, Crispin takes off on what should be a routine flight to the ducal palace from the castle at Devil’s Rest. But he is flying into a trap. There are whispers of treachery among the duchess’s many daughters, rumors of hidden knives in the planet’s court . . . if he can even make it there. With no one coming to save him and only his sister, Sabine, and a few injured guardsmen to protect him, House Marlowe’s least famous son must make his heroic stand, and contend not only the foes arrayed against his house, but with the cultists who dwell in the mountains above his family’s ancestral home . . . . -Goodreads

The Review:

I started Howling Dark, then noticed a 50 year gap between the first two books -> surely that missing time must be what the novella is about?

No, as it turns out.

Not related to Hadrian’s story at all, this novella gives a glimpse into the lives of side characters left behind early in Empire of Silence. Assuming those characters get some screen time later, this novella will come in handy adding some depth to draw on. I’m curious to see how the events in both corners of the universe will eventually affect each other.

There’s a lot going on in this universe and I like that life moves on away from the main character – it enriches the story. That said, I didn’t find Crispin’s POV distinctive enough from Hadrian’s, but I still think him interesting as a basic profile.

Recommendations: While this didn’t add anything to my experience of the main series at this point, I get the impression it will have greater significance later on in the series. Worth reading, but only if you plan on basking in the series.

Thank you to my Patrons: Dave, Katrin, Frank, Sonja, Staci, Kat, Betsy, Eliss, Mike, Elizabeth, and Bee! <3

Other books you might like (if you like the Sun Eater series as a whole, and not necessarily based on this short story):

by Niki Hawkes

Feb 5 2024

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Book Review: Empire of Silence by Christopher Ruocchio

Title: Empire of Silence

Author: Christopher Ruocchio

Series: Sun Eater #1

Genre: Sci-Fantasy

Rating: 5/5 stars!

The Overview: Hadrian Marlowe, a man revered as a hero and despised as a murderer, chronicles his tale in the galaxy-spanning debut of the Sun Eater series, merging the best of space opera and epic fantasy. It was not his war. On the wrong planet, at the right time, for the best reasons, Hadrian Marlowe started down a path that could only end in fire. The galaxy remembers him as a hero: the man who burned every last alien Cielcin from the sky. They remember him as a monster: the devil who destroyed a sun, casually annihilating four billion human lives—even the Emperor himself—against Imperial orders. But Hadrian was not a hero. He was not a monster. He was not even a soldier. Fleeing his father and a future as a torturer, Hadrian finds himself stranded on a strange, backwater world. Forced to fight as a gladiator and navigate the intrigues of a foreign planetary court, he will find himself fighting a war he did not start, for an Empire he does not love, against an enemy he will never understand. –Goodreads

The Review:

Booktube was right -> this is amazing.

There wasn’t a single thing I didn’t like about Empire of Silence. Having read and reviewed books for an audience for so long, it’s a rare thing when I can turn off my critical mind long enough to enjoy a book with wild abandon. I loved everything from start to finish.

And they tell me it only gets better!

This book was a cool hodgepodge of fantasy and scifi. It read kind of like a Stormlight Archive book in tone and scope, but in a dramatic scifi setting not unlike Red Rising. And did I mention the writing voices was akin to Rothfuss’ Name of the Wind? I realize I’m referencing many SFF heavy-hitters, but Empire o Silence had so many of the best elements of each that I feel it deserves the comparisons.

My favorite aspects of the book were the characters and world-building. The character profiles enhanced it all. The main character reminded me a little of the Mandalorian where he periodically gets the ever-loving crap kicked out of him, but has to figure out how to pull himself back up. Sometimes he gets in his own way, but it’s always interesting to me to see the growth arc of a character like that. I also love the blurring of genres, and how creative the setting. Everything from the human cultures and infrastructures to the delightfully weird flora and fauna… so cool. And the alien villains? Loved them.

The writing was lyrical without being too heavy-handed, the pacing was on-point, the characters were clever and engaging, the world-building was epic and fun, the villains were bomb, and I’m so excited for the rest of the series I can hardly stand it.

Recommendations: if you loved any of the series mentioned in this review, then you’re already primed to like Empire of Silence. Give into the hype-train… it’s worth it.

Thank you to my Patrons: Dave, Katrin, Jen, Frank, Sonja, Staci, Kat, Betsy, Eliss, Mike, and Elizabeth! <3

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