James Nicoll Reviews

2022’s The Thousand Eyes is the second and final book in A. K. Larkwood’s secondary-universe sword-and-sorcery Serpent Gates duology.

Having survived the thrilling events of The Unspoken Name, retired divine sacrifice Csorwe, her lover (the scholar-mage Qanwa Shuthmili), and their duelist pal Talasseres Charossa have become murder-hobos for hire, protecting the inquisitive as they foolishly commit archaeology in a multiverse filled with things about which mortals are happier not knowing¹.

Currently, their employer is one Dr. Ilver Tvelujan, an ambitious historian with an underdeveloped sense of self-preservation. Tvelujan won’t be making past the next paragraph.

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2020’s The Unspoken Name is the first novel in A. K. Larkwood’s new series, The Serpent Gates. 

Csorwe is the latest in a long line of Chosen Brides of the Unspoken One. Until she turns fourteen, she will serve as a prophetess in the House of Silence. When she turns fourteen, she will ascend to the Shrine of the Unspoken One, perform a religious rite, and then disappear into the Shrine, never to be seen again.

What exactly happens to the Brides is unknown — each Bride enters the Shrine alone — but hauntings by revenants of previous Brides suggests that it’s nothing good. Csorwe will soon discover for herself the fate of Brides, because her fourteenth birthday is imminent. 

Then a stranger arrives.

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