By Lou Morgan

Solaris, out now

When she learns her true heritage, a young woman becomes caught in the battle between the angels and the Fallen – and It’s a war that’s turning hot.

The sureness of touch with tone and character belie the fact that this is Lou Morgan’s first novel: we’re thrown in at the deep end, along with our heroine, with very little quarter given. If you don’t concentrate on the information you’re given in the first part of the book, then you’re going to miss out on a lot of the nuances and foreshadowings.

Morgan creates a believable world where a hellmouth is exactly that (think about it), and where angels carry guns. The big names among the Angels are some of the worst, and just because they live in Heaven, it doesn’t mean that they’re above behaving like utter bastards towards humanity. Nobody’s motives are clear-cut, not even the Prince of Lies. There are certain similarities with the way the Eternal Struggle was presented in the recent TV series Eternal Law, but this is a far more realistic version.

One of the book’s strengths is Morgan’s dialogue: she, and the characters, are aware of the heightened reality in which it’s set, but it’s brought down to Earth (literally in a sense) by the way in which the characters talk to each other which gives the audience easy access to some of the more otherworldly elements.

Verdict: A terrific start to a new fantasy series. 8/10

Paul Simpson

 

 

 

 

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