A time of dread

Nice guys finish alive, and not always last, in this gritty but not grimdark fantasy of battling supernatural forces, set in a fantasy world where humans battle the demonic Kadoshim with the assistance of the Ben-Elim, a winged race of warriors from the ethereal Otherworld. Bleda, a human warrior-prince whose siblings are killed by a Ben-Elim they attacked, is taken hostage and raised by the Ben-Elim. When the supposedly defeated Kadoshim suddenly spring out of hiding with their own human allies and human-demon children, Bleda teams up with Riv, a fellow denizen of the Ben-Elim citadel, to take them on. Riv finds that the angels she knows often fight and scheme among themselves, their conflict instigated by the issue of "improper" human-Ben-Elim relationships. Separately, Sig, a bear-riding giant familiar from Gwynne's The Faithful and the Fallen series, embarks on a solo quest to eradicate the Kadoshim, and Drem, son of a trapper, discovers his heritage is with the Order of the Bright Star, who have their own fight against the demons. The Hebraic names are a bit misleading, since neither the characters nor the cosmogony are recognizably Jewish in any way. Gwynne relies on some of the currently popular elements of high fantasy-blurred lines between good and evil, a willingness to kill off significant characters-but avoids much of the cynicism that reduces epic struggles to mere realpolitik. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.