The Empire of the Dead The Godsblood Trilogy Book 1 eBook Phil Tucker
Download As PDF : The Empire of the Dead The Godsblood Trilogy Book 1 eBook Phil Tucker 
She killed the gods. Raised most of their divine children as undead. She should have finished the job.
Acharsis is a shadow of the demigod he used to be. Son of the god of male fertility and knowledge, his charm has been sanded down, his smile broken, but still in the depths of his eyes glimmers an irrepressible desire for life. For adventure. For revenge.
When he drifts back into the life of an old flame, he's quickly caught up in events beyond his control and comprehension. Enlisting the help of an old rival and summoning the few and scattered reserves left to him, he dares to dream of the impossible, to contemplate a scheme so insane that it just might work to topple and destroy Irella, daughter of the Goddess of Death, killer of gods, ruler of the undead and architect of his fall.
It's time for some holy vengeance.
The Empire of the Dead The Godsblood Trilogy Book 1 eBook Phil Tucker
I picked this one up on its release day, being a pretty big fan of Tucker’s Chronicles of the Black Gate series. This one intrigued me because it was described to me as “necro-Sumerian Ocean’s Eleven fantasy” which, let’s all just be honest here, sounds badass AF. Who could resist? Certainly not me.Our story starts out with Acharsis returning after a sixteen-year-long leave to apologize to Annara, the woman he left behind all those years ago, and Jarek, the friend that he betrayed on the day that all the gods but one died. On that same day, Annara’s son Elu is kidnapped and taken away to be sacrificed in the imperial city. So, naturally, Jarek and Acharsis, our two remaining demigods, along with Annara, follow the kidnappers to the imperial city of Rekkidu, where Jarek once ruled, and put together a crew of shannanigators (which is a word I just made up) to save him and thwart evil!
I really enjoyed this story! It was action-packed and well put together. The heist was well planned out and not too predictable. I loved the characters, and how some of them were quite witty and made me laugh. It should be said that the phrase “Damn it all up Nekuul’s netherhole” wins at curses for being both crass AF and culturally appropriate. I chortled at more than one of Acharsis’ and/or Kish’s curses. It also helped that these curses didn’t straight up replace the good ol’ F-bomb, but instead were used as comic relief.
The idea that demigods lose their powers when their divine parent dies is an interesting one and it makes a lot of sense. Acharsis and Jarek are much less powerful than they were before the day of betrayal, but as Annara points out, they’re still more powerful than the average human being. So, perhaps the gods aren’t dead, exactly. Perhaps they’re just asleep. They both seem to have changed from the men they once were. Twenty years of hiding out from the empress seems to have done that. Jarek even seems to suffer some legit panic attacks, which was kind of interesting, for the son of the god of earth and stone. He’s supposed to be strong by his very nature, so it was interesting to have that trope somewhat subverted in a way that I can actually sort of relate to.
While I did love Acharsis and his quick thinking, Kish was my favorite character of the bunch. I couldn’t help but love her right from the get-go. I love a good strong female character that doesn’t take any crap from anyone and that’s why I also love Kethe from the Chronicles of the Black Gate series. Tucker knows how to write a kick-ass lady, which is awesome. All the female characters in this book are strong willed and kick-ass. They know what they want and they take it.
I’m excited to see where the story goes. Excited for more zany Sumerian Ocean’s Eleven action!
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The Empire of the Dead The Godsblood Trilogy Book 1 eBook Phil Tucker Reviews
As much as I raved about Phil Tucker’s Chronicles of the Black Gate, you would think I would’ve jumped at his Empire of the Dead, book one of the Godsblood Trilogy.
You would be wrong.
Partially.
I actually one-click bought the book when it first came out, but it immediately lost me in the first few pages. Why? Because no matter how unrequited my man-crush is on Tucker’s prose, I can’t stand zombies. I never made it through an episode of The Walking Dead, didn’t like World War Z, and only grudgingly read my own crit partner’s The Reburialists (which is actually quite awesome, despite it’s ugly Big 5 cover. Check it out if you’d be into Ancient Egypt and zombies). It wasn’t until Reddit’s r/fantasy chose Empire of the Dead as their book of the month that I decided to pick it back up.
Minus the zombies, which I still don’t care for, Empire of the Dead has everything I would expect out of a Phil Tucker book compelling characters, intricate worldbuilding, and a complex plot, all put together with his typically beautiful prose.
Yeah, about that prose. One element I particularly enjoyed in Chronicles of the Black Gate was how the author created distinct narrative voices among the five viewpoint characters, captured brilliantly by narrator Michael Noah Levine, while maintaining engaging wordsmithing. Whether it was the spectacular narrator of the audiobook in Paul Guyet, or it is Mr. Tucker just improving at his craft, Empire of the Dead captures unique, compelling narrative voices even better.
The two main characters, Acharsis and Jarek, pop off the page with their unique voices. Both demigods, their powers have diminished due to the deaths of their divine fathers two decades prior. Both have dealt with the loss in their own ways Acharsis, by starting a shipping company, Jarek by sequestering himself in the middle of nowhere.
The epic adventure begins with Acharsis returning back to his homeland where only the Goddess of Death reigns supreme. With the exception of undead workers, it’s a second-world Babylon wonderfully portrayed through clay tablets, bronze weapons, and towering ziggurats. Acharsis plans to find Jarek and apologize for his part in the killing of all the gods, save for the Goddess of Death. Along the way, he stops in a backwater village to visit a former lover, Annara, who he hasn’t seen for sixteen years.
As timing would have it, a caravan of Death Wagons is passing through—like in Monty Python’s Holy Grail, the death wagons collect the dead; though for the most nefarious reasons to reanimate the corpses to work as cheap labor. This time, however, the Death Wagons have come for Annara’s fifteen-year-old son, Elu, and not because he’s won the lottery.
Unable to rescue the boy on the highway to the local capital of Rekkidu, what ensues is an absolutely insane plan that comes off like something out of Oceans 11 or Mission Impossible. This means first assembling a team of divinely-gifted Godsbloods (people directly descended from a God, typically the child of a demigod), assessing their resources, and adapt on-the-fly as original plans fail.
For fans of the Dragonlance series, Acharsis is Tasslehoff Burfoot to Jarek’s Flint Fireforge one happy go lucky, the other dour, though Acharsis also has a contrasting streak of Mission Impossible’s Ethan Hawke, in that he comes up with the most ridiculous plans, and is unabashed at the likelihood of said plans’ failure.
The supporting cast members also feel vibrant and alive. One of the main villains, Leech Yesu, has a false-modesty that owns the pages he appears in. A believer in the departed gods, Ishki is an old lady with a heart of gold, and surrogate mother of Godsbloods Sisu and Kish.
It’s a fun, quick read, which will be sure to pick you up after watching 13 Reasons Why or reading The Poppy War. Though I still don’t like zombies, I’m going to rate Empire of the Dead a 9.126542060, coincidentally the phone number of the morgue in Tattnall County, Georgia.
There's only one word I can think of to describe this book fun.
This is a different kind of story from Phil Tucker, who has written the excellent Chronicles of the Black Gate series (three books out, with two more to go, I believe). That series is epic fantasy with a capital E. This one is less epic, more tightly focused. It's basically a heist story, though the object being stolen is a person rather than some treasure. But it also becomes much more than that.
It's a story of a world where most of the gods have died and only the goddess of death remains. As such, necromancy is all over the place. That might seem like a tired trope of fantasy, but I think Tucker did it very well, putting some new twists on old ideas.
The biggest positive out of this book was the action. I already knew that Tucker could write great action scenes, and he delivered again in this one. I found myself frantically flipping virtual pages for much of the book. The beginning was a bit slow, and it took me a while to warm to the characters, but once I did, I was along for the ride. And it was a great one.
The only real issue I noticed with this one were a few more typos and editing issues than I've come to expect from Tucker. They weren't egregious by any means, and I don't think they should detract from anyone's enjoyment of the book. I do think it could have used one more proofreading pass, though.
Overall, I really enjoyed it. I didn't like it quite as much as The Path of Flames, but that's a high standard to live up to.
Rating 9/10
I picked this one up on its release day, being a pretty big fan of Tucker’s Chronicles of the Black Gate series. This one intrigued me because it was described to me as “necro-Sumerian Ocean’s Eleven fantasy” which, let’s all just be honest here, sounds badass AF. Who could resist? Certainly not me.
Our story starts out with Acharsis returning after a sixteen-year-long leave to apologize to Annara, the woman he left behind all those years ago, and Jarek, the friend that he betrayed on the day that all the gods but one died. On that same day, Annara’s son Elu is kidnapped and taken away to be sacrificed in the imperial city. So, naturally, Jarek and Acharsis, our two remaining demigods, along with Annara, follow the kidnappers to the imperial city of Rekkidu, where Jarek once ruled, and put together a crew of shannanigators (which is a word I just made up) to save him and thwart evil!
I really enjoyed this story! It was action-packed and well put together. The heist was well planned out and not too predictable. I loved the characters, and how some of them were quite witty and made me laugh. It should be said that the phrase “Damn it all up Nekuul’s netherhole” wins at curses for being both crass AF and culturally appropriate. I chortled at more than one of Acharsis’ and/or Kish’s curses. It also helped that these curses didn’t straight up replace the good ol’ F-bomb, but instead were used as comic relief.
The idea that demigods lose their powers when their divine parent dies is an interesting one and it makes a lot of sense. Acharsis and Jarek are much less powerful than they were before the day of betrayal, but as Annara points out, they’re still more powerful than the average human being. So, perhaps the gods aren’t dead, exactly. Perhaps they’re just asleep. They both seem to have changed from the men they once were. Twenty years of hiding out from the empress seems to have done that. Jarek even seems to suffer some legit panic attacks, which was kind of interesting, for the son of the god of earth and stone. He’s supposed to be strong by his very nature, so it was interesting to have that trope somewhat subverted in a way that I can actually sort of relate to.
While I did love Acharsis and his quick thinking, Kish was my favorite character of the bunch. I couldn’t help but love her right from the get-go. I love a good strong female character that doesn’t take any crap from anyone and that’s why I also love Kethe from the Chronicles of the Black Gate series. Tucker knows how to write a kick-ass lady, which is awesome. All the female characters in this book are strong willed and kick-ass. They know what they want and they take it.
I’m excited to see where the story goes. Excited for more zany Sumerian Ocean’s Eleven action!
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