Title: Gods of Dark Swell – Book 2 The Western Realm
Author: David Dowell
Publisher: Xlibris
ISBN: 978-1524518653
Pages: 569
Genre: Fantasy
Reviewed by: Thomas Macolino
Pacific Book Review
The Gods of Dark Swell – Book 2 The Western Realm is the continuation of David Dowell’s Gods of Dark Swell series. The Western Realm continues to add layers of complexity and intrigue not only into the vast continent of Dark Swell, but also to the teenagers that serve as its gods.
Dowell’s sequel picks up right where his first book left off, so for those readers who haven’t read The Gods of Dark Swell: Champions of the Realm, I highly recommend reading that first before starting this novel. After the completion of the first quest in the first book, the sequel continues with the gods and their namesake champions striving to complete the next quest set for them by the mysterious Creator.
That being said, I was glad I read Champions of the Realm first. Dowell’s writing is the epitome of the adult fantasy genre: the prose is solid‒not as complex as literary fiction nor as simple as middle grade fiction‒but the plot is thick with layers and the world is both vast and detailed. In this, Dowell exhibits some of the best and the worst qualities of the genre. In the negative category, there is simply too much going on. Dowell’s POV’s include: every single champion, every single child-god, the Creator, three or four Villains, and easily half-a-dozen other minor characters. As such, the reader spends a great deal of time zipping and bouncing from place to place like a pinball without getting a chance to settle. However, it is a testament to Dowell’s ability as a writer that even while zipping from chapter to chapter, I was still engaged and interested.
Coming back to Dowell’s book as an example of the fantasy genre, there was a subtle difference in the tone of this book than his first novel. Champions of the Realm had the feel of the old school of high fantasy, powerful champions molded after Beowulf and young heroes coming into their powers like Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time. This second novel still has those aspects, but there is a definite increase in the darkness of the novel. Evil has started spreading not only throughout the continent of Dark Swell, but into the series as well. There is a distinct (but perhaps not intentional) Game of Thrones influence in this novel. The machinations of the child-gods, the ignoble deaths of minor characters and protagonists alike and the focus on showing an entire world as opposed to following a few characters, all of these things have a definite GOT tint to them.
That being said, The Western Realm is definitely a page-turner. The mystery of the Creator’s motives loom over the story like a storm cloud, and the evil creatures festering in the shadows have begun to make their move, promising an epic confrontation in the next installation.
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