Title: Hall of Smoke
Author: H.M. Long
Release Date: 19 January 2021
Source: ARC provided by publisher
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

I had the pleasure of receiving an ARC of this book from the publisher, through my work, and WOW am I glad I got to read this! Hall of Smoke, from Titan Books, is the debut release for author H.M. Long. This standalone novel is epic fantasy vaguely inspired by Norse/Germanic cultures, featuring a kickass heroine and gods who literally walk the earth. The basic premise is this:

The world has fallen into chaos as gods wage war against each other, using their human followers and acolytes as pawns and weapons. In the distant past, the new gods had emerged and defeated the old gods, caging them away. These new gods walked the earth, calling their chosen peoples to follow them. But now the old gods have escaped, and all people may perish in the wake of their rage. Caught in the middle is Hessa, a priestess for the goddess of war Eang. When she is exiled by her goddess for disobedience, Hessa unwittingly becomes the only surviving member of her order, her home temple having been attacked and ravaged by invaders from the mountains. Now she is on a quest to fulfill the orders of her goddess and kill a man she has already failed to kill twice. On the path of this quest, she will encounter people from an empire with armies more numerous than the stars in the sky, face down gods old and new, and learn to question everything she has ever been taught about the gods and her place in the world.

It is difficult to discuss why this book is fantastic without getting too spoilery, but I shall attempt it. The main character, Hessa, is powerful and intelligent, complex and flawed, pious and full of doubt. She makes mistakes. She contemplates giving up. She is forced to question and reconsider everything she has ever believed. The entire novel moves with breathless, relentless intensity as Hessa encounters setback after setback. I swear she could NOT catch a single break. The people she encounters are by turns compassionate, brutal, and cunning. The people who tried to help her usually failed or died, or ended up betraying her. And yet she never gives up. She keeps pushing forward. And it was so amazing to witness.

The world-building is rich and textured, with an enormous pantheon of petty, violent, vengeful gods. As I mentioned, the cultures are at least vaguely inspired by Norse/Germanic tribes, filled with blonde and red-head, axe-wielding warriors, and mountain men, and earth-worshipping nomadic tribes. One of the main antagonizing forces (one of several) also appears to be based on the Roman Empire: they are invading from an outside land, with an empire that is far more vast and powerful than Hessa had been able to imagine (bigger even than she had assumed the WHOLE WORLD to be), they have an all-powerful emperor under a uniting government, with a highly skilled and regimented military. So yeah, very Roman. But that is not to say that H.M. Long just plopped a carbon copy of these cultures into her book with different names. She has clearly done her research (I believe she is a historian who specializes in Norse culture?) but she also gives it all her own spin, her own creative world-building twists. And it works very very well.

On top of all that, the intensely-driven plot packs all the excitement, drama, and bloody fight scenes you could possibly hope for. The fight scenes are extremely well written, with all the visceral edge-of-your-seat brutality you might expect from the finest of action films.

I really enjoyed this book. I would highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good epic fantasy in the vein of Brandon Sanderson or Robert Jordan, and especially if you want a good epic fantasy but need a break from the giant sprawling series that won’t be complete for another ten or fifteen years. And I cannot wait to see what H.M. Long writes next!

You can pre-order the book at all the usual places, including: Indiebound, Bookshop.org

It is also (spoiler alert!) the January adult book option for the Fox & Wit book subscription box service (which is where I work, fyi). We might have a few copies left for pre-order here: Fox & Wit Adult Book Subscription.