Age of Legends Overview

Age of Legends by Kelley Armstrong

There are spoilers contained in this overview

 

I really enjoyed Kelley Armstrong’s Age of Legends, surprisingly so. Coming off the Darkest Powers and Darkness Rising trilogies, Age of Legends is a breath of fresh air. It is totally different. Everything from the setting to the trilogy formula is just so different and really, really refreshing. I’m pretty sure I said that Armstrong could do better, and she definitely did with Age of Legends.

Age of Legends has a vaguely medieval but not really geographically set empire. Like, it’s definitely Chinese/Japanese inspired, but that’s not really shoved in your face as far as the actual setting goes. Could really be any medieval-y style society given that most of the time the characters don’t spend anywhere with particular architecture. I mean, the surnames of the clans are all Japanese, but the first names aren’t. The “Empire Born” are also given preferential treatment here and are not white, which makes a change from a lot of this kind of fantasy. Yes, the Moria and Ashyn are white, but they’re just about the only two in the entire trilogy who are. I liked that even though I honestly didn’t think about it until afterward. Also, there’s a poorly explained caste system that basically serves to explain how to tell the good guys apart from the bad guys and Gavril’s sense of honor. Not sure it was strictly necessary, but it was there.

There isn’t really a love triangle, which I appreciated. There’s plenty of relationship drama, for those interested, but it’s really mostly Ronan and Ashyn misunderstanding each other a lot. The whole Gavril-Moria-Tyrus thing is mostly a non-issue as far as the usual love triangle antics are concerned. Moria knows where she stands and who she wants to be with and both men respect her decisions on that score… with gusto is either direction, really. I like that Moria and Gavril are able to go from platonic to vaguely romantic to enemies to platonic again without much in the way of melodrama. Age of Legends had plenty of actual plot drama to keep me engaged.

I’m honestly disappointed we got so little of the Seeker and Keeper power set. In fact, their powers have very little do with anything in the entire trilogy. They don’t rely on them at all and appear to not even know the full extent of their own powers, no one does, not even the elder Seeker and Keeper who trained them. Really, their powers just seemed to be an excuse to give them their animal sidekicks — Daigo and Tova — and to explain the differing personalities of the girls. The sensing of spirits and ability to dispel them barely come in handy until the last book and then only in certain circumstances… Anyway, I was disappointed. Also, what does the Empire do with male twins?

From the Seeker and Keeper stuff, we do get some mention of the Empire’s religion, but again, that’s kept quite vague. The Seekers and Keepers play some role in pacifying real spirits that… are apparently kept in really good shape given we see nothing bad happen apart from the shadowstalkers and occasional possessed dead body. I’m pretty sure the religion some kind of state-sanctioned Buddhism with a Shinto twist, probably, given we’ve got a sect monks mummifying themselves. And, of course, there’s a big emphasis on the filial piety thing. It plays big into Alvar Kitsune’s plans for taking over the Empire… speaking of which…

I also wasn’t very impressed with Alvar Kitsune as a villain. He’s like Lord Voldemort from the Harry Potter books (I said this in my Forest of Ruin review) except he doesn’t fulfill that promise of ultimate menace. I felt nothing as he cleared the way for Tyrus to take the throne there at the end, because honestly, the other princes got zero “screentime” and mean nothing to the reader. Alvar’s downfall at the end was also unsatisfying because as soon as he started chanting upon accidentally killing Gavril, I knew what was coming next… a life for a life. Super obvious. I also really don’t understand how he got shadowstalker spirits into and then out of the children with no one noticing. It doesn’t make any sense, partially due to no one really understanding how his sorcery works at all. Just… Alvar was such a disappointment in the end.

Even though Alvar himself was a crap antagonist, the way he worked in the shadows was actually kind of impressive. His use of rumor and deception on the people of the Empire worked really well. This is where the little-explained caste system really came into play. If you knew that Warrior Caste were the only ones who could legally wield swords, it stood to reason that any publicly acting dude with swords was Warrior Caste and therefore carrying out the will of the Emperor. Using rumor to discredit Gavril, Moria, and Tyrus was pretty well executed, even if I did have an issue with how that plot line was resolved.

I personally would have liked to see more of the fantasy elements explored. We get a good bit with the shadowstalkers and fiend dogs and dragons, but everything else showed up once and disappeared. The fantasy elements honestly almost seem to be there just so the story wouldn’t have to be historical fiction. It’s not a detriment to the story, just, ya know, I like more fantasy in my fantasy.

Age of Legends is definitely a good trilogy and worth a read. The fact that a good portion of my gripes have to do with wanting more out of the world is a good thing, I think. It was well enough fleshed out for the story, but I definitely wouldn't mid stepping back into this world to learn more about it.