David Estes’s Truthmarked (The Fatemarked Epic #2)
Description
Three kings are dead – three of the four kingdoms have felt the sting of the Kings Bane, and the prophecy forges on.
A prophecy foretelling how peace will come to the four kingdoms forever battling. How some must die for the sake of many. How the Fatemarked will change the world.
As the strokes of prophecy continue to land and the four kingdoms earnestly continue their bloody war, those who had dismissed the prophecy begin to question, while those who worked to conceal the prophecy begin to scramble.
Disclosure
I personally bought this book. There was no agreement with the author, publisher, or any third party that I would publish a review. The following review is unsolicited, unbiased, and all opinions are my own.
Review – Spoiler Free
Truthmarked is the second book in David Estes’s The Fatemarked Epic series. I picked up the first book because of its recommendation as being similar to Michael J. Sullivan’s writing style. While it didn’t match the vibes of Sullivan’s work that I love and it was a lot darker of a story than I enjoy, I did like the storyline and enjoyed some of the characters. So, while I wasn’t blown away by book one, Fatemarked (read my review here), I did like it enough to continue on to book two, Truthmarked.
Written just like in Fatemarked, the chapters bounce between different main characters’ points of view (POV), and Truthmarked picks up where Fatemarked ended, moving the story right along and introducing readers to new integral characters. Estes has a lot of storylines in motion by the time Truthmarked starts, and he continues to ramp the story up with further developments and complications. It’s got the large cast, and all the overlap and interconnectedness you’d expect of an epic fantasy.
One thing I absolutely loved, and hope more writers would emulate, was how well Estes drops the reader into the second book of a series. Truthmarked is a book two, but you could very easily read it without having read book one. Not because nothing important happens in in the first book, but because of how well Estes catches the reader up in the beginning of Truthmarked. Before the story even starts, he summarizes book one in a section titled: The story so far…, and later on in the individual chapters, as individual characters and events are reintroduced, he provides a few seamless lines in-story that give context for a new reader. Having read Fatemarked a short while ago, I found myself picking up on this more than I think I would have otherwise, since it was so well done.
Book 1, Fatemarked, was dark for me, and while the dark vibes didn’t increase in Truthmarked, they didn’t decrease either. There is a lot of war, and death, and characters that seem bent on another’s demise. One main character even begins a journey headlong toward a villainy all their own.
In my Fatemarked review (again, you can read it here), I told of one main character whose POV chapters I really didn’t enjoy – well, now their part in the story is only increasing, and I haven’t warmed to them at all. With that character’s increase and with the decrease of other characters who I did like, I found that I didn’t like reading Truthmarked as much as I did Fatemarked. While I thought the thing that would make or break this series for me would be how dark it got as it continued, I found instead it was the characters I enjoyed that had brought me through book one, and that I was looking to again in book two.
Both books have been good reads, and I can definitely see potential for the story remaining interesting and engaging for the full five books in the series, especially with new developments presented in Truthmarked. But, I’m just not looking forward to reading book three, Soulmarked. I think that’s because of my aforementioned thoughts on certain characters and their dynamics – the ones I’m liking most are waning, while the ones I’m not liking at all are moving more toward center stage.
Overall, I liked David Estes’s Truthmarked, it smoothly continues the large, sprawling story that he started in Fatemarked. But I will not be continuing on to book three. The series hasn’t swept me up enough to continue – mainly because of the increasing importance and play of the character I don’t enjoy, and its continuing darker vibes. If I dedicated more time to reading I would probably continue the series, but because of how few books I read in a year, I want to put that reading time toward books that I will enjoy more.
So, my discontinuing the series isn’t statement to Estes’s writing but more to my personal preferences in stories. I would recommend Truthmarked to the same people I recommended Fatemarked to: people who like epic fantasy with tangled storylines, set in a dark, gritty world that reads like possible modern conflicts in a fantasy setting.
Quote
Our greatest moments are often unseen and unheard, but they are never unfelt.
Kyla (Truthmarked, Dvid Estes)
Ratings
- Quality of Writing – 3
- Plot – 3
- World Building – 3
- Characters – 3
- Ease of Reading – 4
- Overall Enjoyment – 3
- Final Rating – 3 (Actual: 3.17) – Liked It
Want to learn more about the numbers I use for rating, and the qualities I’m thinking about when writing a book review? Check out my post How I Rate and Review.