Cover Image: Empire of Light

Empire of Light

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Member Reviews

This felt a real let down.
Although the world building was well done and the actual story was enjoyable.
Unfortunately the characters and there relationships felt underdeveloped.

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I SO enjoyed this read!! The action was fast-paced, the characters were complicated and lovable, and the plot had me guessing the whole way through!!

I really enjoyed the political aspect, and couldn't wait to see where it brought us.

I will absolutely be continuing with the series!

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There’s a lot happening here and I would like to know how the story ends, but I encountered non-consent and assault (which wasn’t warned for) at the halfway mark and did not feel able to continue.

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3.5 starts
I fell into a reading slump about 21% through this. No fault of this book, I was enjoying it, life just got crazy and reading became a chore. I picked this up again a few weeks later and fell right back into it.
The world building is simple, it just plays off our planet in the future, so it’s easy to imagine yourself there. My only issue was that I wasn’t sure if magic was present or not. There were parts where I thought it was and other parts where I thought the ‘abilities’ were science based. I wish that had been clearer.
I love, love, love the LGBTQ+ rep in this book. I can’t decide which character was my favourite as I enjoyed all of them. In all, a very solid first book from the author. I will seek out the sequels.
The author did a great job of listing any and all trigger warnings. It might have seemed like overkill but you never know what another has experienced.
ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

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I really enjoyed this first book by this author. She had a lot of world building to do and she did it without bogging the story down. In fact, this was I think the most action packed novel I’ve read this year so far, with only a very thin enemies to lovers romantic plot.

Our main character is a mercenary named Damian in a futuristic world where everything has gone to shit. He works in what is effectively the slums, with a small merry band behind him. One of them is his lover Aris.

This book also had a killer internal magical world, known as the Voyance. It’s not just magic without consequences, though. Whether you use it as magic or not, the Voyance will eventually use up and kill its host.

When the president’s son helps blackmail Damian into working alongside him, it’s only a matter of time till the two of them start to bond, although the sniping lasts for the whole book.

The other side characters were present, though not particularly memorable.

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When I heard that Empire of Light was described as “sweary, queer Firefly” I knew it was going to be up my alley. And I was right!


Empire of Light CoverDamian Nettoyer is the Empire’s go-to gun. He kills whoever they want him to kill. In exchange, he and his rag-tag gang of crooks get to live, and Damian’s psychokinetic partner and lover, Aris, isn’t issued a one-way ticket to an Empire-sanctioned lobotomy.

Then Damian’s latest mark, a suave revolutionary named Raeyn, kicks his ass and demands his help. The first item on the new agenda: take out Damian’s old boss—or Raeyn will take out Damian’s crew.

To protect his friends and save his own skin, Damian teams up with Raeyn to make his revolution work. As the revolution gains traction, Damian gets way too close to Raeyn, torn between the need to shoot him one moment and kiss him the next. But Aris slips further away from Damian, and as Aris’ control over his powers crumbles, the Watch catches on.

With the Empire, Damian had two policies: shoot first and don’t ask questions. But to save the guy he loves, he’ll set the world on fire. (Goodreads)
Goodreads

I received an eARC of Empire of Light from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Alex Harrow and I are also mutuals on Twitter.
Per the author, Empire of Light needs trigger warnings for graphic violence (including shootings, beatings, tasing, mild gore, depictions of a hanging, and an execution by burning), explicit sexual content (including mentions of sex work, a sexual relationship that begins in a negotiated contract for sexual services, and on- and off-page descriptions of explicit sexual situations involving bondage, control, mild pain play, and Dominant/submissive dynamics), trauma (including allusion to past physical and sexual abuse, and a depiction of a panic attack), deaths of supporting characters (including a young teen, mentions and depiction of assisted suicide, and one queer character who is a person of color), as well as substance abuse (alcohol, smoking, drugs, and a mention of an overdose).

The entirety of Empire of Light is focused on found family and protecting the ones you love. As you’ll know, I am a huge fan of found families in fiction and in reality. Harrow did a great job at making this family feel real with complicated interpersonal relationships that will break your heart. I do wish we had gotten to know a few of the family members more, but Harrow makes the reader feel like they’re a part of the family.

The action scenes are beautifully written and the main plot line is complex enough to keep you on the edge of your seat the whole time. It will leave you wondering.

I really enjoyed Empire of Light and I can’t wait to see what happens in the sequels.You can pick up a copy on Amazon.

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This novel is beautiful and gives voice to LGBTQ+ that is rare in today's world. Branded as "gay firefly with magic," Harrow delivers adventure, romance, and humor, all within great writing. There are over three hundred instances of the f-word, which may not be for every reader, however.

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3.5 stars

This one was a ride. I'm honestly not exactly sure where to start with this review. There was so -much- crammed into this that I'm not sure I'll feel any assessment quite does it justice.

The pros:
-I enjoyed the world building. It was an interesting sort of sci-fantasy dystopia. Definitely really intriguing and well put together.
-The atmosphere. This one was gritty and I felt it. Very sensory, sounds, smells, tastes. It was immersive dragged me into it and washed me along for the ride.
-The story itself was a wild sort of political mess with a lovely enemies to lovers arc right in the middle of all the rest.
-I really enjoyed Raeyn. I felt for him, perhaps in a way more than I did for Damian even though with first person the entire thing was seen through Damian's eyes.

The cons:
-Wow a lot happened. This was good in that it kept me there a bit on the edge of my seat but a con in that it was almost too much. This was fast paced and though my reading has been spotty and slower than usual so far this year it was still almost exhausting to read.
-Violence. There's lots of it and no shying away from it. It's as vivid and immersive as the rest of it so though I didn't personally mind much it was almost hard to cope with.
-There were parts of the twists and turns that were nearly confusing, and things that I really would have liked to see better explained. As it looks like this is the beginning of a series, though, I will expect those to be dealt with as it progresses.

Overall, I liked this one. It was not at all the light pick-me-up sort of read I might have needed just at the moment but there was never any question at all of not finishing it. Slow reading and all I did quite enjoy it. I do like this sort of thing: the action, the intrigue, the tense relationships were all right up my alley.

I will definitely be keeping an eye out for future books. I'd really like to know what happens next. And hopefully see more of Raeyn and Damian. So to me this was a solid 3.5 stars, not flawless but definitely very enjoyable.

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What a wild ride!!!
Full of action, intrigue, betrayal, assassinations, love, friendship, loyalty and magic.
Set in the future. It's kinda dystopian and kinda sci-fi and part fantasy, part love-triangle, but then so not triangle.
This book does not fit into a box, into a genre and by the looks of it, neither does the author.

The story is told through Damian's eyes, a thieving gun for hire in the Empire (consists of the whole earth under one government, but lo and behold- they are corrupt.) But all the action is happening in Helos (Old New York).

Raeyn was my absolute favourite. His wit, his charm....oh darling...

There was a content warning at the start, which I found totally unnecessary. It's almost a "this book has a lot of violence and sex in, don't read it" when you know that will only make people want to read it more.
If that is the case, and they (the author whose pronouns are they/them/their) did it on purpose, I don't agree with the method.

That being said, I enjoyed this book immensely, I rooted for the characters and cringed when they got shot at (again and again and again), when they got stabbed (less than shot, but still a lot), basically anytime their lives were in danger (so, all the time).

The Firefly reference near the end was a wonderful surprise.

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do feel kind of bad about quitting The Empire of Light by Alex Harrow. It’s queer! It’s science fiction! It’s #ownvoices demisexual rep! But it and I just weren’t jiving for some reason. I made it about 15% of the way through before deciding to quit in favor of a book that gets me more invested and excited. It might have some of what excites me about a book, but in other ways it’s not to my taste. For one, it’s mostly focused around male characters, although there were women in supporting roles in the 15% I read. I also just wasn’t feeling the Damian/Raeyn romance. I know Damian’s demisexual (and so is the author), but it as reading like every other sexual-attraction-fueled “enemies to lovers” plotline I’ve encountered.

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Hey friends and fam! Crazy times we live in, right? I mean, it’s MARCH and there’s over two feet of snow in my yard, the economy is in shambles, spicy chicken nuggets are back at Burger King . . . . (Alas, I’ve betrayed my one true weakness: THEY’RE ONLY 1.50$ FOR A TEN PIECE GUYS, YOU THINK I’M ABOVE BUYING FIVE BUCKS’S WORTH OF NUGGETS? I’M NOT. I’M TRULY NOT.)

Anyways, it’s with this in mind that I come to talking about the cool, hip, and all-around amazing book of the week, EMPIRE OF LIGHT by Alex Harrow!

First things first, this cover is beautiful. Second thing, Alex Harrow is one of my personal heroes and I love following them on Twitter and seeing how they navigate the world as a schoolteacher while being genderqueer and all around Not Straight and Not Cis. (Gently prods my professor daydreams that have withered and died because I’m too scared to come out to any college that could employ me, lmao.)

ANYWAYS . . . this book (once I get money) will have a nice, prominent place on my shelf in any home I own. Not only because it’s gay as hell (which it is), but because it does one thing better than anything else I’ve read: it personalizes a revolution.

I know, I know, but let me explain. Throughout the story, our protagonist Damian is motivated by very few things, the key one being that he wants his found family and his boyfriend safe. Anything he does, you can trace it to that key thread. Damian even admits to himself (and to us, the reader) that he takes jobs from the head of the Watch solely because he knows he can keep her attention on him and away from Aris (who is said boyfriend).

And then? And then? We get to see what happens when everything is for naught and everyone he loves gets hurt or killed anyways.

His motivation for everything is so inescapably personal that quite a bit of the political stuff doesn’t matter to us. We’re deeply entrenched in Damian’s perspective, and we feel every punch, take every hit, and mourn every loss with him. To the point that we don’t need to know anything else to know that whatever system is hurting him in this way needs to change.

God, what a read guys. Check it out – it’s out now! And check out the podcast ep on iTunes, Spotify, and Awesound!

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I really enjoyed this book, the world was very unique and the characters were well developed. What I liked about this book is that the science fiction elements were very easy to understand but also very enjoyable to read. The main characters were also great.

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An exciting book from a debut author! I'll look forward to seeing what queer offerings Harrow has to give in the future.

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I immediately liked the premise for it being not only fantasy and dystopian but LGBTQ. Damian and Aris got my attention but I also liked that their relationship started to fade, which is different from other LGBTQ reads.

This is a fast-paced book, which can be your cup of tea or not.

Aside from the main character, Damian who I liked, I didn't get that connection from everyone else.

Overall, if you're looking for something with a lot of action, set in space, with m/m love interests, then I'd definitely say give this a read.

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I loved it but don’t think I could go through that again. From broken pasts to fragile futures, Damian has a small group he’d do anything to protect. I liked the shadows, their little makeshift family. Not too keen on Aris but I did like Raeyn with his ‘darling’ drawl. I liked how everything played out in the end but the rollercoaster had more than enough surprises. Felt a bit like a sci-fi wild west. Contains death, romance, a little smut and plenty of guns.

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I enjoyed Damians snarky narrative, but I never got super attached to him despite his tragic back story. I loved how inclusive and diverse this book was, but I wasnt a fan of the main male/male romance. I enjoyed the enemies to lovers romance that happened later a lot more. I still think it would have been even better had the first romance already been over when the story began. I just didnt like Aris all that much, but Raeyn did eventually grow on me. As for Jay, she was my favorite character and I wish we got more of her. I also really liked their old blind leader Iltis. I was excited for the whole found family trope, but the direction it went in was pretty disapointing. I also felt like some of the characters decisions didnt make a whole lot of sense.

Despite the fast pace I was easily able to put this down and read something else. Theres a fair amount of plot twists, but since I wasnt completely invested they never really had that major shock factor. A couple of them were unexpected, but that doesnt mean I was happy with the results. I feel like some of the conflicts could have been cleared up with more communication. Im all for action and violence, but since there was so much of it the stakes lost its intensity after a while. It also took away from time spent on the world and the characters. I really think some elements could have used a bit more development. I did enjoy the blackmail and all the political scheming. The writing wasnt always very clear and consice, but I still managed to read this in a couple days.

I thought this was going to be a space scifi, but its definitely more of a dystopian set years in the future. The entire world is supposedly low on resources and was consolidated into one government after the last huge war, but it didnt really feel that way. I never got the impression that the government was controlling the world, but more like a small country. As for resources, they talked about using gasoline a couple times so I dont know how low the resources really were. I also wanted to know where the psychokinetic powers called the voyance came from. I did like that it had consequences though. I have a feeling the sequel might have more world building, but with the way the ending wrapped up I dont think Ill be continuing on with the series. It almost felt like a standalone and Im fine with leaving it at that.

*This Book Will Also Be Featured In My Monthly Wrap Up & February Book Haul In The Next Few Days

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I would rate this 4.5 stars.

Damien is a guy trying to survive by making the hard choices. He's loyal and will do anything for the family that's been cobbled together in this dystopian future, especially his lover Aris, which puts him right between a rock and a hard place. He's working as an assassin for the Watch, the police force of the Empire of Consolidated Nations, run by Commander Faelle Valyr. The story is set in Helos, previously New York before the Wars of 2090. Everyone is corrupt. When Damien gets sent to take out a corporate guy named Mael Taerien, he's caught and blackmailed into killing Valyr instead. Taerien's henchman Raeyn sticks close to his side to make sure he cooperates. As the action intensifies, battle lines are drawn but they are fluid and everyone has to adjust to the ever changing landscape.

This is a gritty story with an almost frantic pace. Damien is like a mountain goat, stubborn yet quickly adapting to all terrains. It's not like he has any choice. The poor guy is in one fight after another (beaten, choked, kicked, stabbed, and shot). Darien tries to play whichever side will help save Aris, himself, and their friends. Aris has his own plans and his own lovers. He's between his own rocks and hard places. The thing is Damien and Aris are both broken and the pieces don't quite match together. That doesn't change anything that is going to happen as everyone runs head first into their future. Damien doesn't ignore things as well as he thinks he does, so the reader understands he sees what he wants to about the people he loves. He also forgets that everyone he loves is not like him. I'm of two minds about the secondary characters not being that fleshed out: that's a huge missed opportunity for emotional connection to the story, and thank goodness or I'd be a blubbering mess.

As Damien gets closer to Raeyn, I wasn't sure who to root for, or against. In many ways Raeyn is a better match for Damien, but there are some major obstacles and their relationship has it's own dysfunction. About halfway through this story my mind was partially blown, because a good author foreshadows. At about three quarters of the way in, my mind was fully blown. The only way this story works at all is because the reader only has Damien's POV. There is no way at all to describe this plot without spoilers. It's an impossible task and I don't want to do that. Just trust that there is a plot twist around every corner in this complicated web of lies and conspiracies. Yes, some seem improbable but that's half the fun. This is action packed from beginning to end and could have benefited from some more quiet moments. They are there, but they are usually gut wrenching in their mental dysfunction, so they are not restful for the reader. They are necessary to understand the psychology of the characters. I also think the unrelenting pace is to stop the reader from looking at holes in the plot, or to try and work out what will happen. But after going through this journey, the end is too optimistic for all the brutal world building that has taken place. Even though this has an ending, I was left floundering around wondering what now, but that might just be that I kept moving after the ride stopped. I'm going to say I enjoyed the ride.

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3.5 STARS.

This was an okay book for me for the most part. I was drawn to this book because of an LGBTQ theme, but the story offers more than that. It's a fast-paced book that offer the readers a distinct taste of a dystopian scfi-fi fantasy. Lines may blur but the book's theme is what sets it apart from other books.

I couldn't wait to read the next books in the series. I hope that the next ones will be better than the first one, but Empire of Light definitely set the tone on what the plot of the series would take.

I'd recommend this for lovers of sci-fi, fantasy, and dystopian with a dash of queer!

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An absolute must read. Empire of light was everything I could ask for in a dystopian novel. There was tons of fast paced action, mystery, danger and a romance that broke my heart and pieced it back together. I loved the MC, and his story was unforgettable.

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The writing was, unfortunately, quite juvenile. Take this line for example: "the bacon tasted like bacon-flavored cardboard". I mean, yeah, this is an ARC, maybe it got changed before the final publication, but you can't change the entire writing style. The rest of the book reads like that line. Frankly, it reads more like fanfiction for an anime I've never heard of than anything else. It doesn't help that it's also littered with S&M male/male sex scenes. Written by, wait let me check...Yep. A woman. So, half fetishization, half cringe

The pacing was awful. It starts off with action, then talking, then random sex scenes. There's no flow. And readers are put directly into this world with a lot of new terms, a lot of characters, with little time to adjust. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate speculative fiction that doesn't try to explain every little detail to you. But a lot of speculative fiction has trouble with giving readers too much new stuff at one time. It's a hard line to walk and, for the most part, Harrow strays more towards the "wait, what are they talking about, who's this?" side.

I also don't like when speculative fiction still has the same prejudices that our dumb real world has. Sometimes it works. But the casual homophobia just feels so misplaced in a world that's at least a hundred years from now. It feels like a cheap conflict. Needless to say, I lost interest very quickly, and I don't care for the overall plot.

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