Book Review of The Last Vigilant by Mark A. Latham

 Name of Book:

Author:

ISBN:

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Part of a Series: Kingdom of Oak and Steel

Type of book: Fantasy, secrets, detective, hierarchy, Intelligence, guesswork, royalty, the mysterious disease, magic, fantasy religion 

Year it was published:

Summary:

Characters:

Main characters are Sargent Holt Hawley, often called Hawley; Enelda Drake and Lady Iveta Snowsill. Hawley is an orphan who is principled and often does right things that could lead him to trouble. He is also disgraced and isn't of the Blood, which implies he is on the lower end of hierarchy. He is determined and does the best he can with what he has. Enelda Drake is the Last Vigilant and is often ten steps ahead of Hawley. She is intelligent, a willing recluse yet something of the past is left in her. She and Hawley don't get along, especially in terms of her excusing the religion from bad qualities. Iveta is a ward and companion to Kings true daughter. She is generous, questioning and is capable of putting others ahead of herself. There are other wonderful secondary  characters such as people working at the castle or as soldiers. 

 
Theme:

Things are not what they seem

Plot:

The story is in third person narrative from Sargent Hawleys point of view, although once in a while we do get Enelda and Iveta. ( I like how her name is very close to my name!) The tale begins with the built up of promised betrayal of Hawley by his company. ( I definitely would have liked more details about the whole control of Blood and what it means as well as what does Awearg mean?)  And then continues when Enelda Drake enters into the story and becomes involved with trying to figure out the mysterious murderers and kidnappers. ( I got the sense that it's a lot like police work, being a Vigilant.) The reader get crumbs of information but they are sparse. Even a bit more down the road Iveta, a ward and niece of the current king enters into the story. Towards the end I was confused as to how and why we got from one part of investigation to another and would have liked more details.   

Author Information:

Opinion:

Before I begin my review, I have to say that the cover really reminded me of Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan and that along with summary is what drew me to the book. This is definitely a more detective story than a fantasy story, although there are plenty of fantasy elements within. Most of the time the story focused on finding out information as to who had done it, which is one of the things I liked about it. The author also provides various glossaries or notes about the working of the world, from names of months to deities to monastic orders and a character list which is very helpful. I definitely feel that the story could be more worked upon, maybe spending a bit more time with supporting characters in my opinion.  

This was given for review 

4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)