I’ll admit something right up front: I’m not the biggest fan of epic fantasy. Your book has spaceships and alien worlds? I’m there. But I’m a bit more reluctant to dig into an 800-page epic fantasy tome. Or I thought I was: Brian Staveley may have turned me around. His just-completed The Chronicles of the Unhewn Throne trilogy in an expansive series that offers up a truly fantastic story, set in a rich and deeply rewarding world. Staveley kicked things off a couple of years ago with The Emperor’s Blades, and followed it up with The Providence of Fire in 2015. Next week, he brings it to a close with the trilogy’s final installment, The Last Mortal Bond.

Political intrigue

From the start, Staveley drops us right into the action: we learn that the emperor of the Annurian Empire has been killed as part of a growing conspiracy that threatens the stability of the world. His death thrusts his three children into a desperate race to stay alive and to unravel the plot behind their father’s death. Kaden, the eldest child, is deep in the mountains with an order of Shin monks, while his younger son, Valyn, is training with the Ketteral, a unit of special forces soldiers. His daughter, Adare, is promoted to Minister of Finance, and must navigate in the center of court intrigue and deception.

Of the three siblings, Valyn’s story is the most badass, and he comes the furthest of the three. When we first meet him, he’s training to become an elite Ketteral soldier. The Ketteral would serve the emperor, but because Kaden isn’t in line for the throne, he’ll serve his brother. This doesn’t seem to bother him, though: he’s content to apply himself on the battlefield. The Ketteral are the Annurian equivalent of Navy SEALs: they’re trained for stealth, demolitions, and to fly giant birds of prey into battle. When Kaden learns his father has been murdered, he’s champing at the bit to fly off to help his brother. Before he does, though, he has to complete his training.

Kaden is deep in the mountains, learning from the Shin monks, an order dedicated to Hull, the god of emptiness. He’s paired up with a new mentor, and is being trained in a very particular talent, one that will allow him to hold his future empire together. As he does so, visitors from the Royal Palace bring terrible news—and attempt to kill him in the night.

Back at the Royal Palace, Adare tries to uncover the mystery behind her father’s death, going after a priest and his order, seeing through his lies and deceptions. However, she finds that the story is more twisted than she imagined, and the real killer is a far more ancient and sinister threat than she could hope to face alone.

Valyn and Kaden meet and are on the run from the Ketteral and Annurian forces pursuing them, forcing them to flee in separate directions: Valyn and his team to the northern lands occupied by the Urgul, and Kaden, Rampuri Tan, and Triste through the Kenta to join up with otential allies. Adare, learning the identity of her father’s killer, flees Annur to raise an army to confront him.

I don’t want to give too much away, but as each sibling sets off on a separate quest, Staveley deepens the intrigue and takes the story in surprising directions. The plot to kill the Emperor is just one small part of a much larger puzzle, and the stakes are much higher than anyone realized, as the specter of war looms.

The world of Annur

What struck me about the first volume was that didn’t take place in a world stuck in the middle ages: this is a vibrant, modern setting. True, this world has all the trappings of a traditional fantasy: swords, and horses, and armor, and so on. The modernity comes not in the battles, but in the approach to governance, to warfare, to life in general. Valyn, training to fly atop giant birds, appears to have more in common with a soldier in the U.S. military. Kaden, on the other hand, is stuck further in the past, learning how to clear his mind, to better serve his god. Adare holds a powerful position in her government, part of a massive bureaucratic apparatus that helps the Empire function.

Compare this to George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, which is explicitly inspired by the brutal, real-life Wars of the Roses. Martin’s books are caught up in the brutality of that time, building a society that carries with it many of the same conventions as that of medieval Europe. Staveley’s unique vision is something very different, and it’s a blod step away from works steeped in nostalgia. Where J.R.R. Tolkien, Robert Jordan, and George R.R. Martin looked to the past for inspiration, Staveley seems to be looking at the world around us; modernity is everywhere, evident in the attitudes each character espouses and the roles they take on.

That said, there’s a considerable amount of history on display throughout, enough for the author to mine for the rest of his career as a fantasy author. As we sink into this world, we see just how deep it goes: lore and legends, history, ancient cities and structures, and more. History is central to just about any epic fantasy, and the world of Annur is as interesting and compelling as any of them.

The stakes

At stake in the narrative is the fate of the world. It’s a pretty typical plot for epic fantasy, but Staveley sets it up things a bit differently. Where one might expect the three offspring to band together to save the world, that’s not quite what’s happens over the course of the trilogy, or in the various factions of which they’re a part. There are layers within layers, and as the ancient Csestriim once tried to exterminate humanity, their renewed presence in the world signals worrisome tidings for the Empire and its subjects. A larger conflict is playing out between mankind, Csestriim, and gods, and the outcome will result in profound changes for the entire world.

The Last Mortal Bond and Beyond

With the Last Mortal Bond, Staveley brings his trilogy to a close, and it’s a dark, devastating finale. It picks up almost a year after the events of The Providence of Fire, and it managed to surprise me again and again. This is not a series content to coast to a predetermined finish. As we come to an end, it’s clear that this trilogy really is something special, and different—which is why it managed to convert even a reluctant fantasy reader like me.

What’s more, Staveley isn’t done with this world: last fall, he signed a four-book deal with Tor, and is currently working on a novel that will focus on one of the secondary characters from this trio of books. It will be in the first person, a departure from the multiple viewpoints on display here. We’ve also been promised a few more books coming down the road, meaning we don’t have to shed a tear at the end (well, not too many of them, anyway). Our world will be blessed with Staveley’s memorable characters and fantastic writing for years to come.