In 2016, I reviewed Vox Day’s lengthy novel ‘A Throne of Bones’ (‘AToB’) and found it to be “very, very good”. Now, 8 years since my review and 11 years since the first book was released, he has finished the sequel – ‘A Sea of Skulls’ (‘ASoS’), which can be bought as an ebook on the Arkhaven Comics website. The book was released in incomplete form in 2016, but not finished until the end of 2023 (nearly double the original length) and your author has refrained from reviewing until now that it is complete. I paid for the original release of the book, and received a free upgrade voucher for the finished version. For those who have not already received it, the final version is well worth buying. Be warned, spoilers follow.
A Sea of Skulls by Vox Day
For those unfamiliar with the series, the, “Arts of Dark and Light” is set in a fantasy world on a continent called Selenoth. The setting and story is dominated by the ‘Republic of Amorr’, which is almost indistinguishable from the Roman Republic. Amorr, however, exists in a fantasy world that will be familiar to players of Dungeons and Dragons and other Tolkien-derived settings. The world contains many of the usual fantasy elements of elves, dwarves, demons and magic. Amorr has some variations in timeline and technology, for example it has a monotheistic faith very similar to Christianity that is already the official state religion. In the real Rome that did not happen until the Republic had been replaced by the Roman Empire. Technology levels vary from bronze-age to medieval – with roughly ancient era Amorr next to medieval Savondir – a France analogue.
The ongoing story, not unlike other fantasy novels such as the Malazan Book of the Fallen, by Steven Erikson or a Song of Ice and Fire by George R R Martin, concerns conflicts between various human and supernatural factions in multiple fantasy states.
