The Reborn King

The Godling Chronicles #6

by Brian D. Anderson

The time has come for the fate of Heaven and Earth to be decided. Darshan will now seek out the Reborn King for a final confrontation. But will his power be enough to free the world from certain annihilation? Will he be strong enough to save the people he loves?

Genres: Fantasy, Magic, Epic Fantasy, High Fantasy, Audiobook, Action, Young Adult

373 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 10, 2014

About the author

Known as one of the O.G. independent authors of the 2010-2012 indie explosion, Brian D. Anderson gained massive popularity right out of the gate with his debut series, The Godling Chronicles. His follow-up series, Dragonvein, was just as popular, Book One becoming a Top Five Finalist on Audible.com for Fantasy Book of the Year in 2015 – becoming the very first independent to reach the finals. But Anderson was far from finished.
After co-authoring Akiri with Steven Savile (Warhammer, Pathfinder, Dr. Who, and Sherlock Holmes) Anderson became the first independent author in history to secure a six-figure audio only deal for his highly anticipated two-book sequel of The Godling Chronicles.
Anderson continued with his indie career with The Vale series. But even after twenty novels, he felt there was more to accomplish. So he secured a three-book deal with Tor Books for The Sorcerer’s Song series.
When not writing, Brian D. Anderson divides his time enjoying his friends and family at home in the sleepy little southern town of Fairhope, Alabama, and riding atop his Harley Davidson, dubbed The Mighty Puck, traveling the country from convention to convention, meeting fans and signing books.

Reviews

[Montzalee Wittmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Godling Chronicles: The Reborn King, Book 6
By: Brian D. Anderson
Narrated by: Derek Perkins
Wow, I loved this book so much! It have the story of the Dark Knight from an early age on up to knighthood and what made him turn against the Order and Church. Then, the ending has the final showdown between Gewey and the Dark Knight! You don't want to miss that! It's taken six books to get here! It was so worth it! Things get wrapped up in unpredictable ways. Loved it!
Thanks to Derek Perkins for six books of perfect narration!!!

[Kathleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The series ends with this book. I quite enjoyed the series, but it began to wear thin. Better to have been a crisp fast-flowing trilogy, or perhaps a quartet. The dialogue isn't clever enough to hold my attention forever. Battle scenes began to feel recycled, and the premise (gods locked away, the creator out of reach, evil shadowing the land) is intriguing, but too thin to support six books. I loved the protagonists, and cringed at the hideous monsters they confronted, but gradually the camaraderie and romance began to wear on me, feeling overdone, a bit boring and meaningless. As for the villain, we didn't "meet" him (beyond a basic intro) and learn what compelled his drive to "burn the world" until the last half of the last book, so I lost interest in him. By book 4, he felt like nothing but a prop, a pasteboard poster-boy for evil madness.

The message of faith and forgiveness and unconditional love is nice, but also a bit overdone, especially when the godling Gewey Darshan describes his meeting with the Creator, and agonizes over the killing he's done (must we feel guilty for putting down a rabid hyena?).

I prefer my fantasies written with subtlety and nuance. No sledgehammers. No sermonizing or moralizing. At times, Anderson verged into the obvious, overt, and pedantic, but it wasn't too bad. This series began to feel too predictable (but not always!), too much like a vapid romance, with a happy ever after for most of the protagonists. I note also that his characters laugh at times when nothing is truly funny. I felt Anderson was forcing conviviality and wit into their interactions.

However, on the upside, some characters felt quite authentic and totally cool, Felsafell, Bastini, Theopolu, Millitt, and Mohinisi, especially. Also, I enjoyed numerous scenes across the series. This author has a vivid imagination. His battle scenes and beastly creatures are vivid. His character development and relationship development isn't bad. The romancing scenes didn't touch my heart, but maybe that's just me. I've read plenty of romances, and have high standards.

A promising career seems likely.

Fabulous performance of the audiobook by Derek Perkins.

[Reader Rick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Worth the wait.

Well, I finally got round to reading this final volume in this series, The Godling Chronicles. it was well worth the wait. I did first reread the other five volumes, just to keep the story fresh.
I enjoyed the story, especially the final meeting between Darshan and the Reborn King. All in all it was a satisfactory ending and I would recommend this to anyone who is a fan of fantasy fiction.

[Loretta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am actually sad to see this end! Very much enjoyed this saga.

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Relatively docile ending to a good series. Everyone lives happily ever after, and yet another relationship pops up, just so none of the characters you might possibly care about have to go into the future alone. The story was good, there is a major flashback that consumes a few chapters providing more than the necessary information. Also a surprising amount of spiritual philosophy which could be interpreted in a Christian light, though I dare say it's vague enough that most people can pull truths out to connect with their own beliefs.

The father/son relationship in the series is heartwarming, and handled well, however the amount of "support group" dialogue contained in the series, particularly in the last three books was almost maddening.

All in all, it's a fun series and I would recommend it, but if repetitive dialogue and description drives you nuts, you might not like it.

[Charles F. Shirley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good read with Christian theme.

Birth death and resurrection with Farshan as Christ. The twelve apostles as demi-gods and Darshans adoptive
father as Joseph, not common in this genre but a fun read, keep with it.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

wrapped up nice & neat

So glad the author brought the story to a nice & tight conclusion...some series drag on beyond reason. All around a fun read, good characters & the story has, you'll excuse the expression, a very good "flow" to it. Thanks, Brian .

[Chester Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really nice ending to a solid series of books.. Great work

[Det Cornforth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Born to be a God

It was a good piece of literature. I've not given the other five books a rating. Preferring to give a rating for the collective instead. I would have liked to say the story was exceptional. Alas, in my opinion it was not. I felt that there was too much narrative explanations , and became tedious to read. Taking into consideration what and who the Black Knight was. I thought the explanations should have been interspersed throughout the six books, rather than being dumped as an afterthought at the end of book six. That for me took the edge away from a good story finish. As a whole, it was a good story, that had me gripped in many places. Would I recommend this collection. Yes I would.

[Nigel · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is final book in what could be called the original story arc and concludes with the battle between Gewey/Darshan and the Reborn King. I have really enjoyed and the series and was enjoying this book until the ending. It was building to the final battle, and even the slight diversion to show the origin of the Reborn King was interesting, timely and was definitely adding to the story.
The battle ends and we are told that Darshan has 'disappeared' and the link between him being Gewey has been broken so that Gewey suddenly reappears from hiding during the war (which doesn't seem to annoy anyone or bring out claims of cowardice). We then find out that although living as Gewey he does seem to retained some of his power after all. To me it read like the original plan had been to kill off Darshan /Gewey as a self sacrifice in order to 'save the world' but an editor felt that the readers would prefer him to live, so that last bit was bolted on rather being part of the structure plot. It felt rushed and not up to the rest of the series.
Unsure at this stage if I will continue with the two sequels to the Godlink chronicles or other Anderson writing as I don't want to become engrossed in a series and then be disappointed by the ending.

[Benjamin Barling · Rating 5 out of 5]

...to an awesome series. While slow in a few places, and a tad disjointed every now and then, this has been a magical story of good vs evil.

I love the story and adored the characters. Derek's narration was constant and entertaining. A huge task for nearly 80 hours of story telling

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

So good reread with a friend. Love the development of characters and all the twist and turns kept me on my toes the first time through guessing where he was going. Now shared with a close friend.

[Steven Ede · Rating 2 out of 5]

it was ok. nothing to shout about

[angie beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing books the character's are so great the adventure the Friendship are amazing I love every minute of it. A must read read for everyone! A great story and wonderful writing!

[Ben Wesson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Epic book brilliant series by this author

[Destiny · Rating 2 out of 5]

Amazing story; so much suspense

[Richard Fortunati · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful series,

The series is full of twists and turns; adventures and love, I highly recommended it. It even has a lovely ending.

[Steven Jamieson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good book

I enjoyed this as much as the others in the series I enjoyed how it is wrapped up with all the survivors of the big battle.

[Rodrigo Bahiense · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very underwhelming end for a poor series.

[Karie Railing · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love it. Brings closure to an ending series! (Im curious what the other 2 books will bring)

[Darin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this whole series. Very nice.

[C.S. Lane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic Read!

I was first introduced to the author, Brian Anderson, when I thought, mistakenly, that he was the author who was chosen to complete the Wheel Of Time series by Robert Jordan: an author that I adored and avidly waited for the next book from with bated breath. It wasn't "him"! Wrong author! But what a happy accident when I downloaded this author instead! I downloaded the first book in this series "to try". I was lost. I couldn't read each offering fast enough and was constantly worried that I would eventually come to...the "last" book in the series. Eventually, inevitably, I did reach the end, but oh what an adventure. I ended up reading his Dragonvein series "and" the Godling Chronicles series too!

This Series will definitely deliver for you that oh so elusive reading nirvana! This book is perfect for young adults to adults.

[Pieter van der Ploeg · Rating 5 out of 5]

This series had a rather weak start with many clichés read in the high fantasy genre but after book 1 things started to get very good. Reccommended !

[Suzie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall, a great series and I would recommend. This last book did draw on a bit, but it could be because the previous book was so jammed back with action and high on emotion.

I think we had to wait too long for the real introduction to the Dark Knight, it just seemed to be shoved in in the last 10 chapters (approximately I have audiobook so hard to tell, but it was the last 2 hours of a 13 hr book), like an afterthought. I would have liked to see more of his torment and downward spiral into evil, he really deserved more book time. The last final battle between good and evil was less than the epic battle I was expecting, it was pretty much the same as all the other battles in the series.

I also felt that some of the emotionally charged scenes just weren't handled as well as they were in the preview book, or maybe because I just couldn't care about characters? That was true about Gewey, but I really liked King Lucius and his battle should have been a tissue moment as had Lee's in the last book, but nothing. Same went for when Gewey met up with want was left of Lee, again, meh...whereas I had tears last book. I feel that either my heart has turned to stone in a matter of days (I read back to back) or maybe the series should have been culled into less books with 5 & 6 being a HUMUNGOUS EPIC.

But, and it's a big but (no not BUTT), it is still a great series that I definitely recommend. These are all minor irritations and my own amateur, non-author opinions. We are still talking about an epic fantasy series that the author no doubt lost a lot of blood, sweat and tears over the course of writing. I will definitely be checking out his other works

[Ritesh Pase · Rating 4 out of 5]

The reborn king is an apt and resounding end to the Godling Chronicles. Finally there is context to who the reborn king is and how he came to be. The author has tried to color the character such that the reader would take the reborn king to be the antagonist without question, but there is yet enough layering of the character to provide a almost human and fallible face to the Reborn king. There is a sense of grandeur and the corporeal to the climax which does justice to the scale and magnanimity of the characters involved in this series.

The absolute end (epilogue so to say) is a bit of a disappointment though. The after explanation of what transpired in the final showdown between a godling and a human who rose to the status of gods is a rather drab one. The author could almost have left this piece to the imaginations of the readers and while not optimal yet, it would have been a better end than what Mr. Anderson has accomplished himself.

It was a fulfilling period for me as a reader, the time that I was engaged by this book. I am going to go with a 4 out of 5 points for this series and the final chapter as well.

[Craig Jr. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book, and satisfying ending to the Godling Chronicles. I do think the author waited too long to provide a backstory on The Reborn King, and why he went evil, and the fact he only wanted to do good in the beginning, to rid the corruption of the land, but by doing so, became the very evil himself, however, I don't think there was enough backstory on it to competently show the transformation. I think it would have been better to have a few flashbacks scattered throughout the books, instead of all crammed before the last battle. I was disappointed with Lee's story in this book, after enjoying the character so much, and you had it in your mind that he wouldn't survive at the end, but the way it was done, it makes it his character completly useless at the end, and even worse when he knows his fate, and willingly goes to it, instead of fighting back or doing something to help during the last battles. I enjoyed the series, and find Mr. Brian D. Anderson to be a good fantasy writer.

[Allegra · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very good. It felt like an epic fantasy in all the right moments. The only part that disappointed me greatly was the ending. It was the ending I expected it would have, but hoped Brian D. Anderson would rise above it. Gewey is a god, stripping of his abilities was taking away a core part of him. Anything else is a lie, his heart would ache to be whole again no matter how love he has for his wife. Ultimately it would have been better if he and his family went to heaven and watch over the earth.

[Arun Andhavarapu · Rating 3 out of 5]

You know a book is the last in the series when the plot goes downhill and everyone including the author is in a hurry to e it the stage. Looks like the author borrowed some ideas liberally from Robert Jordan's epic "Wheel of Time" esp. the part about Gewey returning from the dead, actually the whole concept of mutually assured destruction.

[Bill Tillman · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Godling Chronicles Book Six

Hmmm, the last book wrapped up the series quite well. I am still wrapping my head around the back story on the Reborn King. A one man crusade to right the world and the unexpected personality were a bit much for me. Plus the reappearance of Gewey with a weak explanation left me flat at the end of of all.

[Whitney Bunker · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did enjoy the end of this book but I don't know was lackluster not OMG what happened how is this the end? I was really hoping to be pleasantly surprised and not get the ending I was expecting. Still it did end thank you for not dragging it on into more books!