The Splintered Sun

Flan's Crows #1

by Tad Williams

New York Times bestselling Tad Williams delivers a thrilling new tale set in the legendary world of Osten Ard, perfect for fans of John Gwynne and Brandon Sanderson

A swashbuckling bandit and his band of misfit rebels navigate a kingdom menaced by dark sorcery and war in this fast-moving epic fantasy

With the old King of Hernystir's health failing, warlords carve up the land and rival factions clash over the rightful heir. Into this chaos steps Flann, joined by allies both noble and common, to help the King’s one legitimate heir claim his father’s blessing and restore stability. But enemies, human and inhuman, stalk their every move, determined to end Flann’s quest before it begins.

Packed with action, unforgettable characters, and the sweeping imagination that has made Tad Williams one of fantasy’s most beloved voices, this is Osten Ard as you’ve never seen it before.

Genres: Fantasy, High Fantasy, Fiction, Epic Fantasy, Queer, Adult, Science Fiction Fantasy

852 pages, Kindle Edition

Expected publication October 6, 2026

About the author

Tad Williams is a California-based fantasy superstar. His genre-creating (and genre-busting) books have sold tens of millions worldwide, in twenty-five languages. His considerable output of epic fantasy and science fiction book-series, stories of all kinds, urban fantasy novels, comics, scripts, etc., have strongly influenced a generation of writers: the ‘Otherland’ epic relaunches June 2018 as an MMO on steam.com. Tad is currently immersed in the creation of ‘The Last King of Osten Ard’, planned as a trilogy with two intermediary novels. He, his family and his animals live in the Santa Cruz mountains in a suitably strange and beautiful house. @tadwilliams @mrstad

Reviews

[Petrik]

ARC provided by the publisher—Hodder—in exchange for an honest review.

The Splintered Sun is the start of a new incredible tale in The Osten Ard Saga accompanied with a relatively faster-paced narrative .

“When you are my age, you will be less dismayed and even less surprised by the path that life leads you. I am alive and among friends. That counts for much.”

It is a bittersweet feeling to have read almost every book in The Osten Ard Saga. I know it might sound like sacrilege that I have not read The Navigator’s Children (the last book in The Last King of Osten Ard) yet. And somehow, I still decided to read this newest book/series in the universe. Curiosity in this new series got the best of me. Or maybe a part of me is just trying to postpone finishing every book in The Osten Ard Saga as long as I can. When I first heard there would be another book in this universe, I was immediately elated. Here are two things you should know about Tad Williams, though. First, do not believe him when he says he’s writing a standalone or a trilogy. If he says he’s writing a standalone, the standalone will become a trilogy. If he says he’s writing a trilogy, that trilogy will become a four-book trilogy. But this is not a misfortune. Here’s the other important thing to remember. Tad Williams does not write a bad book. Every book he has written in The Osten Ard Saga ranges from great to amazing. And The Splintered Sun, originally penned as a standalone and now it has turned into a series, is not an exception to these two rules. I am confident those who bounced off reading The Dragonbone Chair could potentially end up liking the pacing and story structure of The Splintered Sun more.

“Mark my words, child. There is no quicker way to lose your mind and your freedom than falling in love.”

So, what’s this book about? The Splintered Sun takes place after Brothers of the Wind but three hundred years before Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy. This book is a swashbuckling story of a fearless bandit and his band of misfit rebels navigating a kingdom menaced by dark sorcery and threatening war. With the old King of Hernystir’s health failing, warlords carve up the land and rival factions clash over the rightful heir. Into this chaos steps Flann, joined by allies both noble and common, to help the King’s one legitimate heir, Prince Ewain, claim his father’s blessing and restore stability. But enemies, human and inhuman, stalk their every move, determined to end Flann’s quest before it begins. And to top it all, the two main characters—Vedra and Daley—will find it impossible to escape the harsh fate and conspiracies they’re about to be plunged into.

“We are all in danger, child, every moment. Every living creature is on a journey from birth to death. How close to that latter destination we are, no one can say.”

Because many people will ask whether this is a good entry point to this universe or not, I will make it clear from the get-go that it is evident that Tad Williams wrote The Splintered Sun with the intention of inviting new readers to the world of Osten Ard. This isn’t to say old-time readers of every book in this world won’t enjoy this book. I doubt that would happen when you’re already a fan of Tad’s writing. We do get to learn more about the Dream Road and the history of Hernystiri, Grasslanders, and a bit of Hayholt—still named Dun ard in this book—with the iconic Green Angel Tower. However, if you’re here expecting to learn something substantial and new about the lore established in the previous books in the universe, this isn’t the book for you. You won’t learn anything significant about the Norns and the Sithi. Things could change in the later books of this series, but for now, The Splintered Sun focuses more on the tale of the two kids, Vedra and Daley, as they find their fates intertwined with Flann Alderwood and his band of outlaws called the Crows. In The Dragonbone Chair, the tale in The Splintered Sun has become folklore, similar to Robin Hood in our world.

“The gods gave us life upon this earth, I know not why, and I can only do my best with what I am given.”

Comparatively speaking, similar to how the early parts of The Dragonbone Chair is told mostly from the perspective of Simon, approximately the first quarter of the book is told from the point-of-view of Vedra and Daley. But there’s a huge difference in pacing between these first installments of their respective series. I absolutely loved every page of The Dragonbone Chair. This includes Simon’s 200-page slice-of-life portion. Some readers, however, find that kind of story structure too slow to their liking. This is where the circumstances differ in The Splintered Sun, and why I believe many modern readers will enjoy the pacing in The Splintered Sun more. Vedra’s capability to scry and Daley’s knack for stealing things—undoubtedly—lead them to conflicts they never expected. From the premise written, I think many people will enter The Splintered Sun expecting Flann to be the key main character of the novel, but it is not. He’s one of the main characters of the book. But most of the book is told from the perspective of Vedra and Daley.

“It means we make our own decisions in this world. That even the gods sometimes must let us choose our own paths, for good or ill.”

This is not a claim that Vedra and Daley are the exclusive key characters. They did have the most spotlight, and I believe Tad did a great job in starting The Splintered Sun from their tale. However, the balance in characterizations is there in the narrative. The varied cast and personality of Flann and his Crows, Xanico, Tika, plus the villains Scaeth and Phelan, have their respective spotlights, and they are there to enrich the dialogue, politicking, and fight for the throne. The book definitely has a faster pace, and I imagine this will click with a lot of readers, but I cannot deny I did miss the slower-paced and melancholic tone of the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy in The Splintered Sun. I feel Tad Williams’ prose is at its best when he writes a somber and melancholic narrative. As far as comparison goes, I think the closest epic fantasy book I can think of that matches The Splintered Sun is The Ember Blade by Chris Wooding. Or, if you like the found camaraderie aspect in Mistborn between Vin, Kelsier, and their crew, there will be a lot to like in The Splintered Sun.

“Families aren’t always what the gods give us to start with, but what we find and gather to ourselves along the way.”

If you are like me, who feels bittersweet about not having anything else in The Osten Ard Saga to read, well, The Splintered Sun is here as a balm to our predicament. Imagine a Robin Hood figure and his band of misfit outlaws fighting against greed to attain justice in the world of Osten Ard. Imbued with Dream Road, deadly vision, prophecy, exciting action, and satisfying final chapters. What more can you ask for in the first installment? Filled with a diverse cast of characters and races, whether you are a veteran or newcomer to the world of Osten Ard, The Splintered Sun will do its best to ensure your reading time and experience in this new tale is absolutely worthwhile. Until the sequel to The Splintered Sun is available to read, I believe it is time for me to accept my time in the world of Osten Ard shall conclude for a while. It is time for me to read The Navigator’s Children.

“As usual, the greedy cannot understand any other motives but greed, whether for power or riches.”

You can pre-order this book from: Amazon | Blackwells (Free International shipping)

The quotes in this review were taken from an ARC and are subject to change upon publication.

You can find this and the rest of my reviews at Novel Notions | I also have a Booktube channel

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[Chewable Orb]

The Splintered Sun by Tad Williams
4.25 rounded down to 4🔮orbs
Pub. Date: Oct. 6, 2026
DAW Publishing



Pawns in a nobility world….

💡 Orbs Prologue: A hired hand, a mercenary, selling my soul to the devil, or rather, Lord Scaeth, the evil bastard son of exiled King Tethtain. First and foremost, Orb is a father. As a warrior, I fight my battles for my kin, hoping to provide my children with the necessities our world takes pleasure in depriving. It would seem that way, since the king himself has left some of his lands to his illegitimate children, First Lord Phelan, a twisted deformity of a young man with murderous intentions, and the conniving Lord Scaeth, both of whom lay waste to all lawful execution of what could be called fairness. So I must tread carefully whilst playing with fire. Tramping along the rocks of a riverbed, I can’t help but look into the gnarled limbs of neighboring trees. Shadowlike figures seem to follow us. But each time I glance back, it is as if these are only figments of a paranoid imagination. An urgent message has been passed down through the ranks: We are to fight Hagan, the Lord’s Reeve and personal confidant to First Lord Phelan. It will be bloody, but that is how we like it, as long as we get our coin from Scaeth….

🧐 A small glimpse: Tad Williams, fantasy novelist extraordinaire, has written another novel based in the world of Osten Ard. The sweeping novel swirls around two children, Vedra and Daley. In the vortex, a world is torn asunder by political aspirations. Three sons of King Tethtain vie for his position as he enters the final stages of life. Two bastards have schemed their way to wealth and power, while a legitimate prince has been tucked away in the confines of safety. But no more; it is decided that a move must be made for Prince Ewain to travel and formally convince his father to name him the true heir. Our exiled king thought Ewain long dead, so this dangerous plan of action could come with deadly consequences. As we meander through brooding and dangerous terrain, Vedra, our resident scryer, begins to see a terrible future. As these dreams become more terrifying, she comes across a lonely boy by the name of Daley who has his own perilous backstory. Always climbing his way in and out of trouble, Daley has gotten them both in a bit of a pickle. One that puts them solidly in the crosshairs of a monumental time in which those vying for power will do everything to stake their claim, no matter the cost.

👍 Orbs Pros:
👏 Epic fantasy done right!
👏 A large cast, but easy to follow!
👏 Hard to not love these young protagonists!
👏 The plot kept me guessing!
👏 Supernatural goodness! I never knew I enjoyed the scrying angle so much. Other realms are horrific!

👎 Orbs Cons:
🤔 Long! As with most epic fantasy, this one wasn’t short.
🤔 May have helped to read prior books in the Orden Ard orbit first. Not completely necessary, but might have enhanced my reading experience!

⚠️ Warnings: Blood and graphic depictions of violence.

Highly Recommended! My first Tad Williams book, and I must say I do understand why he gets so much love as an author. For those who love fantasy from the likes of Tolkien, George R.R. Martin, or Rothfuss, Williams should also be a must-read author. On to the Dragonbone Chair!

💡 Orbs Epilogue: Pointy arrows whistle past my ears. The heightened sounds of chaos begin. I bang my club against my shield in preparation. Something has led us to this culmination of anger and hatred, and I fear an invisible enemy pulls our strings like a marionette. A barrage of smoke and blood fills the air. The morbid sounds of war engulf us all. As the noise decreases, a stillness settles, a sure sign of victory, and for the moment we have triumphed. A bigger issue remains: Flann’s Crows, a band of murderous thieves, a ragtag group always plotting to take back what they perceive is rightfully theirs, including rule by the rightful heir, Prince Ewain. The prince is currently seeking his dying father’s word that he should inherit king status once he passes away. Our duty is to imprison or kill Prince Ewain, driving a final nail in the coffin of this gross fallacy. A frightening sound emanates from above. Up on a small ridge, an otherworldly beast voices its intention, and I am afraid, dear readers, that I may not be long for this world. Snarled jaws lash out, and then darkness comes….

Many thanks to DAW Publishing for the ARC through NetGalley. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

[Alexandra]

Immersive, sprawling, slow, classic

“Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn” series was one of my formative reads back in the day. It was a happy surprise when I saw that NetGalley had a new novel by Tad Williams set in Osten Ard. I am afraid I remember very little about Osten Ard, but I was hooked. It’s nice to be guided by an author with a classic fantasy voice who has been doing this for a while. I felt small bursts of joy every time I realised how immersed I was.

We have an absent king; we have two bastard sons of the king, half-brothers in an uneasy truce – they would rather be at war; we have good people trying to keep a young legitimate heir to the throne safe. The world is complex, fascinating, frightening. Unexplained dark things are hiding in the shadows. There are numerous characters, too many to mention in one review. I liked them all – except for the very villainous villains, naturally.

This is also a book about two children who unwillingly thrust into things they don’t understand and did not ask for. 10-year-old Daley lives through a life-shattering tragedy in the very first chapter. Vedra is 14, She has had her share of tragedy too. Vedra is homeless, but keeps it a secret from her clients. She makes her living as scryer, and her gift happens to be strong and true. Vedra and Daley meet and adopt each other. I loved their found siblings dynamic very much.

”At least I still have this terrible, sometimes amusing boy to take care of,” she thought. ”Everyone else may leave, but he won’t, and I wouldn’t let him – even though there are moments…”

If it were up to me, I would keep Daley chained to Vedra at all times. I think Vedra would appreciate that. Unfortunately, it isn’t, so Daley does something that sets off a chain (a cascade, a waterfall?) of events that makes the book grow epic, dark, and bleak. The children’s lack of control in the adult world was one of the strongest themes in this book and I appreciated it very much.

Vedra and Daley meet a band of outlaws. They are the nice kind of outlaws and their leader is Robin Hood, sorry, Flann of Alderwood. Flann is both infuriating and entertaining. Since every self-respecting band of nice outlaws needs a minstrel, there is also Diarban, who is very likable and fun.

”Flann always keeps his ideas a secret,” said Diarban. ”That way, when they don’t work, he can claim that failure was part of the larger scheme.”

Together, they will live through many adventures, many schemes, many intrigues, many narrow escapes. I liked that this book did not turn away from grimness. War is always war, even when the good side is waging it. Innocent people still suffer. Good people have to do cruel things.

I did have trouble with the repetitive behaviour of some of the characters – now they are being themselves again… and again… and again. It got old after 200 pages, which is annoying when a book has more than 500. There were quite a few editing issues as well, especially in the second half of the book. I am assuming they will be taken care of before publication. But these are minor complaints.

Towards the end it is clear that we could be in for a long ride, a fantasy series of many books. If it happens, I’ll be there.

One more fun quote:

”The fairy-lord seemed to attempt a reassuring look, but he clearly had not done so in some time and the effect was mixed.”

Many thanks to the author, DAW, and NetGalley for the free ebook!

[Lucas]

I received a copy of this book on Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 a bit conflicted on this one and what to rate it.

This is marketed as a fun Robin Hood adventure and while that's part of it, Tad really just does his thing here and it's not drastically different from other books in this world, you have to enjoy being in this world because it is a very deliberately paced and often slow burn.

Some of the difference here is the scale is a bit more constrained, we're not doing a world wide epic fantasy but there's still plenty of POVs, a contested throne succession, a lot of ingredients for epic fantasy that we know and love.

Overall this is a really good book and I enjoyed reading it, Tad is one of my favorite authors. The reading experience is great and his moment to moment writing is some of the best. There's a lot of beautiful writing and great turns of phrase, it lives up to his pedigree here.

However, I really think the plot is one of the slowest we've seen in Osten Ard so far and there's a lot of anticlimactic moments. After finishing the book I'm wondering what the point of it was and that's not a good feeling after investing so much time on it.

There's some good world building nuggets and good exploration of the magic but I was hoping for a bit more, there's some hints at larger things at play but I needed something more to really make me eager for the next book.

I will definitely continue the series but I'm not as hungry for more as I was hoping to be. There's a lot of great characters and the slow building that I had with them was good, so there was a nice mix of characters, world building, action, and the slow burning plot.

[S.B. (Beauty in Ruins)]

It may have taken Tad Williams more than two decades to return to the world of Green Angel Tower with the sequel series, The Last King of Osten Ard, but here we are again, only two years since that wrapped up, and we find ourselves in Osten Ard once again, this time with the launch of a prequel series, starting with The Splintered Sun.

This hearkens back to Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn in that it follows two children as the primary characters, surrounding them with politics and mythology, but it feels like a simpler, more streamlined tale. It's a story that slowly grows beyond them, adding characters and POVs as we go, but it's the children who serve as its heart.

In terms of plotting and pacing, this almost feels like two books in one, which makes sense knowing that Williams began it as a standalone book before deciding it would be part of a series. You can see the bones of the standalone book, and it's a good one, a solid tale that certainly delivers on its Robin Hood promises. Left to be that, I think the pacing would have been tighter, the narrative more immediate, but you can also see where elements were layered on to give it the depth necessary to justify a full trilogy. For me - and, I suspect, for established fans - those additional elements are the most interesting parts of the story, but the way in which they're incorporated does see the pacing falter in places.

Honestly, I struggled a bit in the first half, finding it hard to maintain my interest, and I think it was because I recognized what was happening. I felt the weight of those elements being inserted, felt how they diverted or paused the plot, and found myself impatient for the plot to get moving. The second half, though, is better, stronger, and more cohesive. You can almost feel where Williams began writing a series as opposed to rewriting a standalone, and everything comes alive. More characters, more plots, more mythology, more conflict, and more complexity... the book just feels more.

Vedra and Daley were an interesting pairing, siblings-by-circumstance if you want to call it that, and the way their relationship evolves through the book is exceptionally strong. I wasn't sure of Flann at first, and Xaniko initially felt forced into the story, but to say they both grow on you is an understatement - and the heartbreaking glimpse into the Norn's heart is powerful stuff. While the two villainous princes seemed a little over-the-top, I became increasingly interested in the people surrounding them, both those tied to their cruelties and those dragged down because of them. Finally, I have to say something in praise of Liam, the gentle giant who seemed wasted for so much of the book, but who steps up and becomes a hero before the end.

There's a lot that happens in The Splintered Sun, but not a lot that's resolved, and I suspect that may leave some readers wanting. So many goals are established that you figure at least one of them will prove to be pivotal, but it seems Williams isn't ready for that. Again, had this been left as a standalone, maybe we'd have gotten that resolution, but as the first book in a trilogy, it raised more questions than it offers answers. Personally, I'm fine with that, and am looking forward to finding out more about the Shadow on the Dream Road, the Norns working from the shadows, and the shadow cast by Vedra's scrying.


https://bibrary.blogspot.com/2026/08/...

[Dan Flaherty]

Classic fantasy at its core, a masterfully told adventure.

Instantly, I fell in love with this cast of characters. I was rooting for Vedra, Daley and the Crows the whole journey.

It was so nice to be back in Osten Ard, I absolutely love the original series, MS&T will forever be one of the best tales ever written. Comparatively, “The Splintered Sun” feels lighter and more airy, possibly a “simpler” more straight forward kind of story, which I feel should help the general public get into Osten Ard culture, and dip their toes into the vastness of the realm.

The events that took place in “The Splintered Sun” are set into motion wonderfully, I’m mostly happy with the outcomes, because they felt “real.” It’s a bleak world, and not everything will happen how you think, or plan it will. You must adapt and persevere, or you’ll end up with an arrow in your neck.

Excited for the next installment of Crow adventures.

Thanks to DAW and NetGalley for the ARC.

[Senne ┃ Bridge Burner Books]

This was my first Tad Williams book and I think it was a great entry into his work, but it didn't quite land for me.

The worldbuilding was solid and easy to grasp, while making it obvious from the start that there is so much more to discover than what this novel shows. The character work was fine, and although there were many different characters and POVs, each was easy to recognize and follow.
The prose was great and flowed from page to page. Williams does an excellent job in immersing the reader into his world.

However, the story is where this book lacks the most. The plot built up nicely with rising stakes throughout, but it all came tumbling down with a disappointing ending. I felt let down and expected more after a 500 page journey. I don’t even know why anything that happened mattered in the end. I understand this is the first book in a bigger series, but I expect more than just a gentle setup from an opener.

But that does mean that there is a lot more to discover in a second book...

[takeeveryshot]

everyone in this book had the same conversation one thousand times

[Sarah Rogers]

Reading The Splintered Sun reminded me of watching The Force Awakens (Star Wars). I was excited to return to a world I loved, only to realize I was getting essentially the same story with a different cast. I still enjoyed it - but I wanted a new adventure, not another version of one I'd already read.

We're back in Osten Ard following Flann, a charismatic outlaw whose band of misfits gets caught up in a struggle over the rightful heir to Hernystir's throne. Williams knows how to write classic fantasy, and there's plenty to enjoy here. The banter between Flann and his companions is genuinely entertaining, and I loved the relationship between Vedra and Daley. Their bond brings some much-needed tenderness to a world that hasn't been particularly kind to either of them. And Williams's prose still has that wonderful, old-school fantasy charm that makes Osten Ard such a pleasure to return to.

But goodness, Daley is practically Simon 2.0. Another young, reluctant hero swept into a much bigger adventure, surrounded by familiar character types and following a journey that feels awfully close to one we've already taken. Even the fight over who gets to sit on the throne feels like a repeat of Memory, Sorrow and Thorn. It's not one particular plot point that's too familiar. It's the whole shape of the story. I kept waiting for something to surprise me, but it rarely did. Maybe I read Memory, Sorrow and Thorn too recently...

Still, this is a house with good bones. It's classic fantasy to its core, full of familiar tropes from an author who helped define the genre. The story is enjoyable, even if it doesn't offer much that's new. I actually think this could be a great entry point into Osten Ard. You don't need to have read Memory, Sorrow and Thorn to enjoy it, and you might even enjoy it more if you haven't.

A solid 3 stars. I loved being back in Osten Ard, but I wish Williams had given me a little more to discover.

Thank you to NetGalley, Hodderscape, and Tad Williams for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Iffy]

3.25 stars! I’m very conflicted when it comes to this book. This is my first Tad Williams and The Splintered Sun is marketed as a good entry point into his Osten Ard world, but I couldn’t help but feel like I was missing a lot of context? This felt like a very zoomed-in adventure quest while I kept wanting to learn more about the larger world, politics, and magic.

We follow many POVs and I did enjoy all the characters, many of them very endearing and layered. However, because the scope is so zoomed-in and the plot moves quite slowly, we spent a LOT of time with these characters yet didn’t get the character development to show for it.

I think this book is primarily set-up for the following books to come in this prequel series because it held a slow and steady pace with little to no climactic moments and not even really any payoff at the conclusion. There was also a lot of repetition and I think this could have been about 200 pages shorter.

I did really appreciate Tad William’s writing style and can see why he is a well-loved author. I do think I probably would have enjoyed this more if I had read other books set in this world first.

[Pete Reviews Books Good]

Check out our full interview with Tad Williams on Realm Runners!

https://youtu.be/8fwJKMafPxM?si=fHih-...

I loved this book. I remember reading The Dragonbone Chair when I was younger and it feeling as close to Tolkien as I'll ever read, by a living author. And thank goodness, Tad is still crushing that vibe; for my money, there's no better author of that classic epic fantasy out there today.

The biggest differences between those earlier Osten Ard books, and the Splintered Sun is twofold; the pacing is much quicker, and it's more dialogue focused, both of which will make it an "easier" read for the fantasy fans today. As much as I loved exploring the castle with Simon for 200 pages in the Dragonbone Chair, even Tad recognizes that a slower start may not be for everyone, and The Splintered Sun may not move at a breakneck pace but it is noticeably quicker.

Dialogue is also a key element that was primarily focused on in this book. It is witty, insightful and full of emotion throughout, making the characters jump off the page and feel like people we've known our whole lives. The POVs were split and I enjoyed my time with each of them.

Overall, this is a must read for those of you who are looking for that "throwback" fantasy feel. It was a joy to go back and spend time in the world of Osten Ard, and I'm very much looking forwards to the next book!

Special thanks to DAW for the ARC, and Tad Williams himself for joining us on the podcast!

[Jenn]

DNF. I'm tapping out. I was into this one for a while. But by chapter fifteen, I was super bored. So I'm done.

[Demetri Papadimitropoulos]

Bad Plans, Worse Music, Excellent Outlaws: The Messy Making of Legend in Tad Williams’s “The Splintered Sun”
A rightful heir needs saving, the Crows need rehearsing, and history needs quite a lot of editing before anyone will want to sing about it
By Demetris Papadimitropoulos | September 26th, 2026

Difficult things happen to stories on their way to becoming legends. Motives simplify. Logistics vanish. Bad jokes improve in the retelling. The frightened people at the edge of an adventure become anonymous helpers, while the person holding the bow acquires a cleaner silhouette. Tad Williams’s “The Splintered Sun” is fascinated by that laundering. Set roughly three centuries before “The Dragonbone Chair,” it returns to an Osten Ard whose future generations will remember outlaws, kings, betrayals, and songs more readily than the grubby sequence of choices that produced them. Williams begins not with Flann Alderwood, the outlaw chief best equipped for legend, but with Daley, a ten-year-old mummer’s child whose mother dies after a confrontation with the troupe-master Yuval. Grief turns into arson. Then Daley hears Beppe trapped inside the wagon he has set ablaze and goes back for him. Before the dynastic machinery starts turning, the novel has already made heroism inconvenient.

Even Williams’s own account of the book’s origin points toward that gap between lived event and remembered story. In an August 2026 newsletter, he explained that an old Jack Mundwode song embedded in “The Dragonbone Chair” led him to wonder whether Flann’s Crows might represent the historical company from which a later outlaw legend descended. He invokes the Robin Hood tradition, but the more revealing part of the comparison is his wish to restore what legend tends to discard: quarrels, ethical disagreements, untidy motives, the ordinary friction of people who have not yet been edited into folklore. “The Splintered Sun” occupies the interval between an event and the story that will one day make the event look inevitable.

Much of the plot is dynastic clockwork, though Williams wisely puts small hands inside the mechanism. King Tethtain is old, absent from Hernystir, and increasingly unreliable. Phelan, his elder illegitimate son, governs as First Lord; Scaeth, another illegitimate son, has soldiers and appetites of his own; Ewain, Tethtain’s only son born within marriage, has the strongest conventional claim but not his father’s acknowledgment. Daley, fleeing into Hernysadharc after his mother’s death, takes shelter with Vedra, a fourteen-year-old Harchan immigrant who survives by scrying. His compulsive climbing carries him into a tower at Knockbeg, where he overhears dangerous political business and steals Scaeth’s signet and an incriminating letter partly because the ring reminds him of his mother. Private grief accidentally grabs hold of public history. The mistake draws both children toward Flann’s Crows and Xaniko, an ancient Hikeda’ya exile whose Threadbare Hall contains rather more history than sound masonry.

Every item in that summary is ready for a ballad: rightful prince, secret letter, forest outlaws, fairy lord, murderous rival, hidden journey. What Williams keeps adding is friction between the shape of the tale and the experience of the people trapped inside it. Daley does not want to save Hernystir. Vedra does not dream of becoming a useful seer. Mearna knows that a good plan can still use a child badly. Xaniko withholds information because he believes ignorance may protect people, which is an exquisitely adult way of converting care into control. The Crows do not become persuasive because the novel declares them a found family. They sew, cook, scout, rehearse dreadful music, nurse wounds, quarrel about tactics, and keep track of who has not come home. Williams makes care logistical before he makes it sentimental.

The sharpest rebuke to the epic machinery comes from Daley. On the way to Dun Ard, Ewain tries to explain the righteousness of the cause, but Daley has had enough of being recruited by other people’s nouns. “We’re not pieces. I’m not. Vedra’s not. We’re real,” he says after comparing the adults’ plans to a board game. The syntax is tiny and devastating. “We” contracts into “I” and “Vedra,” then returns as a human category rather than a faction. Ewain speaks in princes, causes, enemies, obligations; Daley answers by naming persons. When Ewain asks whether the justice of the cause matters, Daley points out that he did not even know Phelan’s or Scaeth’s names before strangers made their struggle his daily problem. The scene does not overturn the adventure. It makes the adventure answerable to the people it needs.

Rather than turn Daley into a precocious political philosopher, Williams keeps his intelligence bodily and local. The boy climbs because height gives him distance from other people, then discovers that distance makes him an excellent witness. He speaks rarely, so his longer bursts arrive with pressure. His world is concrete: food, ledges, doors, pain, whether Vedra is near, whether a wall can be scaled, whether an adult is lying. Vedra’s attention moves differently. She notices social judgment, hospitality, obligation, and the possibility of being sent away. Mearna sees relational consequences before the strategists do. Bellicent reveals herself through the gap between what she reports about Scaeth and what the reader can see her admitting. Williams’s rotating close third does not reinvent its vocabulary for every point of view, but it repeatedly changes what information feels urgent. History is never neutral lore here. It is something half-known, mistrusted, misremembered, or explained by people who have reasons for explaining it that way. Even the comedy changes with the watcher: Flann’s jokes can look like charm, evasion, or recklessness depending on who has to live with the consequence. The shifts are modest at the sentence level and consequential in judgment.

In sentence after sentence, Williams prefers lucidity to display, yet he is exact about rhythm. After Daley’s mother dies, long sentences of shock contract into two words: “Light. Fire.” White space follows, and the next remembered action is Daley carrying a torch toward the wagons. That cut does more than another paragraph of grief could have done. Elsewhere, especially on the Dream Road, syntax loosens and imagery arrives faster than interpretation. Vedra can perceive before she can understand; Daley, by contrast, often understands by reducing the world to its practical terms. The distinction is not absolute, but it shapes meaning: Daley’s trauma compresses language, while Vedra’s visions flood it with more sensation than she can safely organize.

Perception is the book’s most persistent trap. Vedra works through mirrors and reflections. Xaniko’s dragonglass device is called the Witness. Letters must be decoded; spies catch fragments; scryers receive images without reliable meanings; Daley sees conversations from roofs without possessing their context. The Amber that links him to Xaniko is described as solid sunlight, “like a splinter broken from the edge of the daystar and fallen to earth,” the title’s strongest internal resonance. Yet the Amber illuminates by exposing. It connects Daley and Vedra across distance while also creating a route through which something hostile can approach them. Access to an image is never quite the same thing as knowledge.

At Dun Ard, that distinction becomes cruel. Williams does not prevent Ewain from reaching his father with one more ambush. He lets the expedition succeed geographically and then breaks its governing assumption. Ewain stands before Tethtain and begs him to look at his face, remember his mother, recognize the evidence of blood. Tethtain responds that his wife died in childbirth and the child died too. Ewain protests. Witnesses corroborate him. The king repeats the sentence. The structure has delivered everyone to the promised destination only to reveal that the destination cannot perform the function assigned to it. A quest designed to secure recognition culminates in the discovery that authority itself has become incapable of recognizing.

Pressed against Ewain’s expanding plea, Tethtain’s repetition becomes almost mechanical. Ewain’s language keeps opening outward: look, remember, compare, acknowledge. Tethtain’s contracts into a memorized formula, closed to revision. A living body cannot dislodge the sentence already occupying the king’s mind. Williams even makes the king’s posture participate: Tethtain curls into his tall chair “like a spider shrinking back into a crevice,” physically retreating from the evidence his office requires him to judge. In a novel full of mirrors, Witnesses, disguises, intercepted messages, and half-understood visions, he becomes the supreme failed reader. His problem is not simply that he lacks information. He has information standing in front of him and cannot alter the story through which he interprets it. The crown stops looking like a solution because the man wearing it can no longer read what is before him.

And yet Williams refuses the easiest conclusion. Ewain remains the sympathetic claimant; Scaeth is murderous; Phelan is dangerous; the Crows continue to regard the prince’s survival as worth terrible risk. “The Splintered Sun” unsettles the moral sufficiency of hereditary power without giving up the rightful-heir structure that generates its adventure. Its politics are skeptical from below but still conventional at the crown. That boundary should stay visible. One reader may feel Williams has troubled an old fantasy structure enough to make it newly alive; another may feel he has mainly made monarchy nicer company.

During one of Mearna’s best conversations with Vedra, the novel offers a rival way of belonging. Mearna explains that friendship necessarily risks betrayal, then observes that Flann and Xaniko resemble one another because both have been hurt, dispossessed, and driven away. Vedra supplies the expansion: “Exiles … All of us.” Flann has lost land and status. Mearna has been displaced. Xaniko is cut off from his people and from the life he shared with his dead wife. Vedra’s first home has become unlivable. Daley has lost his mother and every structure that followed from her. The kingdom arranges identity through blood, title, ownership, and sanctioned inheritance. The Crows arrange it through shakier practices: usefulness, affection, memory, argument, return.

In practice, the Crows earn the warmth the novel gives them. Tika heals people who would otherwise die. Mearna notices when Vedra has been frightened into silence. Diarban’s music is sometimes art, sometimes disguise, sometimes coded message. Mollie’s hospitality at Threadbare Hall begins with baths and food before anyone bothers with destiny. Near the end, when Xaniko is inexplicably stronger after being brought home, Mollie says only that “the house helps him,” then clarifies that it is “his place.” In a novel crowded with castles, camps, ruins, towers, and contested lands, the most restorative architecture is the least impressive one: a cracked house held together by habit, memory, and people who know where the cups are.

Membership, however, never becomes morally spotless. The adults who protect Daley and Vedra also deploy them. Xaniko withholds. Flann compartmentalizes. Daley is sent with Ewain because his peculiar relation to the Dream Road makes him useful. Late in the book, with Xaniko wounded and the Crows trapped in the Greenwrack, Vedra enters the Dream Road and finds him confused enough to mistake her for the granddaughter he has never met. She recognizes the error and exploits it, calling him Grandfather so he will tell her how to guide everyone out. Afterward, while the others praise her, she thinks: “I tricked him.” The sentence is plain because the discomfort is not. Her growth into agency has not preserved her innocence. It has made other people dependent on decisions she can no longer keep clean.

If Vedra learns that responsibility can require deception, Flann learns its bloodier arithmetic. At Serpent’s Vale he has Scaeth in his sights and desperately wants to kill him. Instead he shifts his arrow to Hrinvart Firemouth because the mercenary captain’s death is more likely to provoke the battle his plan requires. “Responsibility is a curse,” he mutters afterward. The joke is characteristically quick, but the choice underneath it is ugly: Flann has selected the death that will produce the most useful cascade of other deaths. His charisma does not exempt him from calculation. The man most likely to look splendid in a ballad has to live through the arithmetic the ballad will omit.

Then comes Chimney Ridge. Flann deliberately turns the Pucai against trapped mercenaries, and the tactic works with horrifying efficiency. Diarban hears men screaming below until he can no longer bear to look. Flann’s hand shakes. He calls what they have done “plain murder,” even as he insists Scaeth forced his hand. Williams is not exposing Flann as fraudulent. Flann is brave, loyal, inventive, and frequently marvelous company. The Crows really do save lives. Their schemes really do outwit stronger forces. The problem is what later storytelling will edit. Centuries afterward, a song could turn Chimney Ridge into a clever victory in a stanza. The novel makes us remain in the present tense long enough to hear the screaming stop.

Roominess is where Williams’s generosity starts charging interest. The novel’s length is not itself the problem. Much of its pleasure lies in routes taken, local histories, meals, disguises, bad rehearsals, small jobs, and the business of getting a company from one dangerous place to another. Osten Ard feels inhabited because connective tissue is rarely disposable. But strategy is sometimes explained once by events and then again in dialogue. During a long account of how Phelan, Scaeth, and Hagan might be maneuvered into damaging one another, Vedra finally complains that the explanation is making her head spin. The joke lands because the reader may be nodding beside her. There is not too much politics. There is occasionally too much explanation of politics already made legible. Williams is unusually good at letting a road, meal, rehearsal, or quarrel carry history obliquely; the weaker stretches arrive when that confidence gives way and characters start diagramming the very pressures the preceding scenes have already taught us to feel.

Of course, some of that amplitude belongs to the design. A story interested in the mess beneath legend should contain things the ballad will not: preparations, conflicting accounts, people learning news at different times, distances that have to be crossed rather than skipped. But that defense cannot become a blanket pardon. Some connective passages merely keep the machine serviced. Uatha carries more thematic weight than psychological complexity, functioning as religious certainty fused with coercive power without receiving the inward dimensionality Williams grants Bellicent. Phelan’s bodily difference is also described twice through strikingly similar images of grotesquerie, a blunt old fantasy shorthand in a book otherwise alert to the unreliability of surfaces. Williams’s humane attention is generous, but it is not evenly distributed.

Put plainly, the materials are old: secret heir, magical relic, forest band, rival half-brothers, hidden routes, ancient shadow. The surprise lies in where Williams spends feeling. A more conventional adventure would make the prince’s recognition the catharsis. Williams denies it. A thinner found-family story would end with an adult announcing that the children have been adopted. Williams instead gives Vedra a quieter sentence. When Flann assumes that she and Daley will travel with the Crows, she answers, “I … I didn’t know we were wanted.” The pause contains a whole education in conditional hospitality.

One internal echo makes the ending better still. Daley’s earlier complaint is that adults keep deciding what he and Vedra will risk. At the end, Daley instantly says he is going with the Crows, but Vedra checks the assumption: did he know, or did he want? The distinction is small enough to miss and large enough to contain the book’s moral education. Knowing what others have planned for you is not the same as wanting it. Later she asks whether staying is what he really wants. He nods. Only then does she say, “We’re Crows now.” The movement is grammatical before it is sentimental. “We” is no longer the category somebody else has assigned them. It is a word the children enter by consent.

Unfinished politics, however, do not make an unfinished novel. Ewain is not crowned. Tethtain is not restored. Scaeth, Phelan, and Hagan remain dangerous. The Shadow has barely come into focus. “The Splintered Sun” is the first Flann’s Crows book, followed by “The Crooked Tower” and “The Holly Ring,” so some unfinished business belongs to a larger architecture. The first volume still needs its own shape, and it has one. The kingdom’s succession remains unstable; the children’s place in the world does not.

Legitimacy is the book’s public argument, but recognition is its private one. That is where “The Splintered Sun” comes closest to Katherine Addison’s “The Goblin Emperor,” though Williams reaches the question from the margins rather than the throne. The Crows cannot confer a crown. They can offer food, shelter, dangerous work, bad music, unwanted advice, medical attention, trees for Daley to climb, and the prospect that Vedra’s gift might be taught rather than merely exploited. It is an imperfect polity, occasionally manipulative and always vulnerable. It is also the most functional form of belonging the novel can imagine.

On my scale, “The Splintered Sun” earns 84/100, or 4/5 Goodreads stars. Its best scenes understand that seeing is not understanding, legitimacy is not recognition, protection can become control, and a good cause can still turn people into pieces. The repeated strategic exposition matters; some antagonists are flatter than the pressures they embody; some of the traditional machinery remains traditional rather than transformed. But the strongest formal choices keep revising what initially looks like a straightforward adventure, and the book’s affection for its people rarely blurs its awareness of what they ask from one another.

Still, the image that lasts is not a throne or even Flann with a bow. It is a battered company returning with wounds, grudges, unfinished business, and two children who assume they are about to be sent away because experience has trained them to expect it. The kingdom has spent the novel arguing over who may inherit it; the Crows answer a smaller question without ceremony. They make room. Someday a song may remember an outlaw hero and a prince saved from treachery. “The Splintered Sun” is better because it lingers just before that song begins, while the blood is still wet, the jokes are still bad, and belonging is still something that has to be asked for, offered, and chosen.

[Lanie Brown]

Vedra has been working as a scryer for the nobles Hernystir hoping to make enough money to at least get by while living in an abandoned warehouse. It is certainly not the greatest life but it is better than working for the slaver her parents sold her too. One evening after scrying for a merchant's wife she comes home to find a young boy in the rafters of her warehouse home. At first alarmed she quickly realizes the boy, Daley, means her no harm and rapidly they become like siblings to each other. The only problem is Daley has sticky fingers, very sticky fingers and after stealing a ring and a letter from the Regent of the kingdom Vedra realizes they are both in very real danger. Knowing that Mistress Peegan, the merchant's wife she had scryed for previously had a big heart Vedra begs for her assistance, Peegan not only agrees to but takes the two children on a pilgrimage with her. Vedra is certain they could not be safer, however, after being accosted by the infamous outlaw Flan and his Crows Vedra and Daley discover that the letter they stole details a treasonous plot against the one true heir by his brothers and that there may be nowhere in the world safe for them. Now, with Flan's Crows the two children are in a race against time to stop a war from breaking out and the assassination of the one true Prince.

So there is a lot to unpack with this book and I am going to do as much as I can because if I say I dislike a book I want to make sure people understand why, because I really did not like this book.

The gist of this is that these two kids Vedra and Daley accidentally steal a letter from the Regent, First Lord Phelan, written by Phelan's younger brother Scaeth. The letter details out a plot to kill their youngest brother Ewain, who is supposedly the true heir to the throne. Vedra also happens to be like some once in a lifetime scryer (this is supposedly important). For some reason Daley is squirrel like and climbs literally everything and anything he can (Daley's climbing and the fact that he likes to steal stuff is how this all starts). Anyhoo, Vedra happens to meet the nicest lady ever and after Vedra explains that they are wanted by the Regent, Peegan decides to take the kids in and take them with her on a pilgrimage, where they are "attacked" by Flan and his Crows (AKA Robin Hood and his Merry Men). Daley being the squirrel that he is climbs a tree during the attack and his shoe falls off where he's been hiding the letter he stole with all the treasonous stuff in it. Flan decides it's important, gets it interpreted by a faerie (I think he's a faerie maybe he's an elf), the faerie decides Vedra and Daley are the "chosen ones" and off we go to stop the evil brothers from killing their other brother. Oh and just by sheer coincidence the younger brother with the target on his head who has survived several attempts on his life already decides now is a perfect time to go ask dear old dad (the king is still alive he just decided to go a completely different country and let Phelan the eldest child rule as regent) to declare him the one true heir.

Yeah, I know that's a freaking lot and it actually gets more convoluted as it goes on, there's also apparently a genocidal woman who is essentially Wormtongue to the king in his self-imposed exile. It's just a lot and even though this is an extremely long book I felt like nothing actually happened. I mean a lot of stuff does actually happen but gods I hate to say it, it all felt so pointless. I never felt like it was truly established that the brothers were evil, so the whole thing felt like a huge overreaction. We never find out why Vedra and Daley are so important to the whole plot. We do find out that there appears to be a big bad in the background pulling the strings of one of the brothers, but we spend so little time on this that it just felt like an unnecessary addition to a plot already overflowing. On top of that I just felt like 75% of the book was one character asking Flan and the faerie what the hell the actual plan was and both of them pulling a Xellos, except they aren't Xellos and it wasn't funny. Some of the chapters were incredibly similar and I feel like many could have been left out. Like we just went in circles the whole book, even when things did finally move forward we still just have the same characters expressing the same concerns.

On top of all of that there were so many decisions that characters made that truly made no sense to me. Like they seemed arbitrary at best even though there was a ton of time spent on ensuring the characters and in turn the readers that Flan and his faerie partner had indeed spent a ton of time thinking about the best course of action.

Oh and did I mention Flan is gay? Yeah this also seems like a weird addition. Gay and apparently unable to stay in a monogamous relationship so his partner or the man that wants to be his partner is the cook of our little merry band of outlaws. This genuinely didn't need to be in there. Flan's sexuality has virtually nothing to do with the story at all and I felt like this was genuinely thrown in as an attempt to offset some of the pretty glaring issues with some other things. Like the fact that Phelan's disfigurement from scoliosis and other birth defects is literally the only thing that's talked about when he's mentioned.

But here's the big thing: I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THE POINT OF THIS ALL WAS!! None at all whatsoever. I just feel like I wasted a ton of time reading a book that had no purpose at all. Like I genuinely almost need Williams to explain to me what his point was in writing this because I truly cannot find one.

At the end of the day, I just can't recommend this at least not to buy. It just felt unfinished (and yeah I get that it's the first book in a new series and again, it feels unfinished) and rushed. Which is a very uncomfortable description given how long it is. Like if you want to read it, I recommend checking it out at the library first. If you find you enjoy it than maybe drop the money on it, but I just can't in good conscience tell people to go out and pay money for this.

As always thanks to Netgalley and DAW for the eArc!

[Raile Bay]

I'm so glad to see Tad return to the world of Osten Ard, in a new era and setting!

I was initially wary of the decision to center two children as the principal protagonists, but I ended up finding it fascinating. These two aren't exactly jumping at the "call to adventure"; not an unusual trope in the fantasy that comes out these days, but I think it is intriguing when Flann's band is very much giving the archetypal Robin Hood band. Daley and Vedra's perspectives, as well as other developments in the plot, help ground the story as a result.

However, I think it won't necessarily work for everyone since they're also more passive players because of: (1) said reluctance to get involved, and (2) the fact that they're, well, children, who likely wouldn't have been able to take much more of an active role in the political intrigue they've found themselves tangled in even if they had wanted to. It also serves to make the tone of the story darker than I had expected given the mythology Tad is drawing on. But it worked more than I thought it would for me, especially because I loved Daley and Vedra's relationship with each other and the risks they were willing to take because of it. They're definitely not your most perfect and straightforward "found family", as readers will see, but there's a very deep care there that I think is at the heart of the story.

Seeing as this is apparently the beginning of a trilogy (no surprises with everything that's set up in this first book), I'm very interested in seeing how the choice to center Daley and Vedra's perspectives plays out in the rest of the books and whether it ends up being the right one. While I was expecting a Flann POV as the stand-in for Robin Hood, he works very well from an outside POV where we're not privy to his thoughts and it's easy to get lost in his grandeur and charisma. I love his relationships with the members of his band, especially Lady Mearna; it's a different relationship compared to the character of Maid Marian that she's inspired by, but even lacking romance, their friendship is clearly deep.

I also really liked the character Long Liam and the kindness he receives from members of Flann's band in the story. One thing I've always thought about stories featuring societal "outsiders" is that they should actually reflect the people who are most marginalized; maybe one of those things you would think go without saying, but it doesn't always necessarily happen. Hence, in telling a fantasy equivalent of Robin Hood with a group of outlaws that lives on the fringes of society and welcomes those who want to make a better world for others like themselves, it makes a lot of sense to make your Robin equivalent queer, and have women and neurodivergent people present among this group.

Aside from the characters, there are several political factions set up in this book, as you'd expect with a civil war on the way. Tethtain himself, initially set up as your larger than life king figure whose actions have culminated in much of the book's current environment, was a more challenging figure than I thought he would be, and I'm particularly interested to see where that plotline heads later. So far, Phelan and Scaeth, Tethtain's two bastard sons, aren't presented with much moral complexity and are about straightforwardly antagonistic/villanous as you'd expect in your classic fantasy, although this is not necessarily a negative.

I do, however, have some reservations about Phelan: he not only comes across as your standard 80s fantasy villain because of what I mentioned above, but due to physical disabilities and deformities that lead to him being consistently seen as ugly and offputting by other characters throughout the book. Yet, given the sympathy Long Liam is treated with (although his condition is of a different nature) I don't want to think this will be your bog-standard ableist depiction. Seeing as Phelan seems much more rational and less sadistic than Scaeth, hopefully Tad does end up going somewhere more subversive with him (i.e. Tyrion Lannister, from ASOIAF; clearly a bad person but you can see how the ableism of society and his family has had much to do with the person he becomes).

While there's a lot of plot hooks and things left unresolved at the end of this book, I don't think people who are familiar with Tad's previous series and the often slow-paced first entries will be too surprised by that (I will note that this book did seem faster-paced in comparison to the prior Osten Ard entries). In addition, as it's been a hot minute since I've read the previous series, I suspect there were several callbacks/references in this book that I may have missed. That said, I think this book is still a good entry point for those who are unfamiliar, as it didn't ultimately have any bearing on my ability to understand the story, though it should be rewarding for big fans of the books.

All in all, I think this was a great start to a new series, and I'm excited to see where Tad takes it from here. 4 stars!!

[Caleb Layman]

I have just finished reading my review copy of The Splintered Sun by Tad Williams (the first in a new series based in his world of Osten Ard).
**This review is unpaid and will be spoiler free.**

An easy way to start this review is by stating just how incredible it is to be back in Osten Ard. Having said it before I'll say it again, Tad Williams has captured something truly special with this world. The Splintered Sun takes place 300 years before events of Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn. You could read this without having read any prior works based in Osten Ard. That being said, having the knowledge of that world from the previous books is certainly nice, though not required. (Moreso makes certain moments feel like clever inside jokes or easter eggs.)

This story follows two young protagonists, a young quiet boy named Daley with a love of climbing and light fingers and a teen named Vedra who is discovering her abilities as a scryer. Both have been left alone in life through seperate tradgedies. One accidental theft later and these two lonely kids brought together by happenstance end up in the middle of a fued between two bastard sons fighting for the throne from their half brother and true heir. Their journey ties them with Flann Alderwood (another portagonist) and his group of outlaws known as The Crows as they attempt to protect the true heir on his quest to claim his rightful title.

Tad Williams has done an absolutely brilliant job of making Osten Ard feel fresh again. The threat in this novel feels different than his previous two series in this world and it shows just how different things were 300 years prior. Rather than the potential ending of a whole world we see a kingdom fueding and how the struggle and treachery unfolds. How a band of outlaws will have to use wit and determination to overcome ruthlessness and staggering odds.

"No, this is our lonely fight, and it is a desperate one. And mark my words, more will die before it is over, some of our own among them."

The characters in this novel are absolutely brilliant! Both of the young protagonists are interesting, well written, and bounce off each other and the rest of the cast so realistically. Flann Alderwood is one of my favorite characters Tad Williams has written. The inspiration from Robin Hood is written clearly here and is done remarkably. I laughed out loud many times when reading Flann's wit. The Crows have lots of charm and great dialog as well. The villains of the story feel real, dangerous, and heartless. One thing I really loved about this book is just how everyone involved in the quest has a good reason to be. You'll learn why everyone is fighting this battle what events led them all together. They may be outlaws but when evil men label you as one, maybe you're not so bad.

The action in this novel is not a constant thing but man is it satisfying when it appears. Tad Williams has not lost any ability whatsoever to write a good fight. And in this case some of them are quite humorous. This book certainly has quicker pacing than The Dragonbone Chair (book one of Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn). I love the pacing of that book and I don't mind a slowburn at all but the quicker approach found is this book is just as welcome. Many people may even prefer it.

When reading this you can expect a charming, thrilling, fresh new tale in the world of Osten Ard. Whether its your first time here, or if you've already fallen in love with the world you're bound to enjoy this. Tad Williams really surprised me in his short novel Brothers of the Wind but how different he could make a familiar world feel and he's done it again with The Splintered Sun. I'm very excited to see where this story takes us! For a first entry I am impressed! Not surprisingly given the already impressive installments in the previous saga I give The Splintered Sun a 5/5. It has everything you could ask for the first book of a new series. And now we wait for more!

Thank you to DAW for this review copy, and many thanks to Tad Williams for his brilliant writing! This man's prose is unmatched! #NetGalley #DAW #TadWilliams #TheSplinteredSun

[Ander Ray]

~Thank you to NetGalley and DAW for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review~

*I want to note something about the marketing of this book. I am not factoring this into my rating, but I think it's important to note. This book has been incorrectly labeled as LGBTQ+; while there is one queer character, it is not a POV character and his sexuality is not a significant aspect of his character nor of the plot.*

Overall, this book frustrated me. It was slow-moving, rife with internal logic problems, and ended in the same place it started with no significant plot movement.

Craft:
The prose itself was generally okay. I think it served the story and was clear and straight-forward.
The dialogue, however, felt awkward. It was as though the characters were speaking for our benefit rather than how they would actually converse with each other. Information and world-building would be slotted into the middle of sentences like asides.

Characters:
Daley and Vedra are charming. I think they carried the story. I frequently agreed with their opinions and perspectives far more than any of the adult characters. They made decisions that were logical for their characters.

When it comes to Flann... I'm not sure I understand who he was supposed to be. Vedra sums him up well. In reference to someone yet again stating how clever he is, we read "Vedra was growing tired of being told that Flann knew what he was doing. She had never wanted to believe anything else, but after hearing it said so many times, she was beginning to think the Crows were trying to convince themselves more than her." AGREED. If he's so clever, he should do clever things instead of us just constantly hearing how clever he is. He doesn't do clever things. I don't understand why he has a band of followers who have given up their lives to camp in the woods and cater to his whims.
Overall, there are a few interesting characters, though besides the two children I don't think their emotional arcs are explored at all or developed. The characters have some interesting dynamics, but their relationships don't change and drive the plot. 

Plot:
This was the area with the biggest struggle to me. Most of the occurrences and decisions don't seem to be inline with the internal logic of the book. The biggest one is that Prince Ewain is no longer safe in his castle stronghold because his bastard brothers are trying to kill him, so he determines he will leave the stronghold and take a dangerous journey to see the king to be declared the official heir. I don't quite understand how such a declaration would protect him from assassination, but I can overlook that. But then Daley finding the cryptic note from one brother to another suggesting they want to kill him (when Ewain is already perfectly aware of this) is a major plot point?
And *SPOILER ALERT* it amounts to absolutely nothing in the end. Prince Ewain does not get his father's blessing and returns to the stronghold because that's where he says he will be safest. *END SPOILER ALERT* So I guess I just want to know what was the point of these 600 plus pages.

[Jessica]

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for supplying me with a copy in exchange for an honest review. ❤️

I was very excited when I got approved for The Splintered Sun. Tad Williams is a wonderful writer, and returning to Osten Ard sounded like such a great idea. And it really is wonderful to be back in this world — even if this time we are travelling much further back in its history, roughly 300 years before The Dragonbone Chair.

We start our story with two young fugitives, Vedra and Daley. Vedra is a young girl with the ability to scry, while Daley is a younger boy with a talent for climbing, sneaking and, apparently, stealing things he probably shouldn't. 😂 They survive by their wits and petty theft, until one night they steal the wrong thing from the wrong person and suddenly find themselves caught up in a conspiracy on a much, MUCH bigger scale.

There is a royal succession crisis brewing, a dying king, people fighting over who should inherit the throne, and dark forces moving in the shadows. What starts as two children trying to stay alive quickly turns into something much bigger.

Along the way, Vedra and Daley encounter Flann Alderwood and his band of outlaws, the Crows. Flann has a very Robin Hood-esque quality to him, and his motley group of companions brings quite a bit of personality and humour to the story. We also meet the mysterious Xaniko, a Sithi who becomes important to Vedra, as well as nobles, soldiers, outcasts, magical creatures and plenty of other interesting characters.

And yes, this is Osten Ard, so expect elves, trolls, magic, strange beings and all the things that make this world feel so wonderfully old and lived-in.

But I have to admit I was a little conflicted. The tempo of this book is slow. It has that very strong 90s fantasy vibe where the author takes his time, introduces characters, builds the world and lets the story wander before everything starts coming together. Normally I actually enjoy that, but here I sometimes struggled to understand where certain things were going.

A LOT happens in this book, yet I wasn't always convinced that everything had a clear motivation or purpose. There were several moments where I found myself thinking, Why are they doing this? Why is this important? Some character decisions especially left me scratching my head.

That said, this is clearly the beginning of a larger story. And considering this is the first book in a planned trilogy, I'm willing to give Tad Williams the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps some of the things that felt disconnected or unnecessary will make much more sense once we see where this story is going.

Of course, not all the plans work out. Because if everything went perfectly, we wouldn't have a sequel! 😂

I'm definitely curious enough to continue. I'm not entirely convinced by everything The Splintered Sun is doing yet, but I enjoyed being back in Osten Ard, and there are enough unanswered questions and characters I want to know more about, to make me want to see what happens next.

[becks]

Huge thank you to DAW, NetGalley and Tad Williams for an ARC of this book.

As someone who has never actually read a Tad Williams book, somehow, I decided to dive in here at the start of a new series and see what I thought of the world of Osten Ard, as I've been told it's a big ol' fantasy series I should be digging my teeth into at some point. Where better than the start of a new arc?

I think starting here is fine. Ideal, even. From what I've gathered, other books in the series are quite deep and complex, and while this book is definitely big and has plenty of twists and turns, I didn't feel like I'd arrived late to a party and found myself struggling to integrate. The story is something that's bound to appeal to new readers, with bands of misfits, war brewing on the horizon and two unlikely characters stumbling across a murder plot that grows beyond them very quickly. It didn't ask me to know every other book in the series, but it did feel like there were nods and treats for people who have. I didn't feel like I missed much, but would be interested in re-reading with more of the Osten Ard books under my belt to see what Easter Eggs I missed.

It feels like Williams wants this to be a new jumping in point, and I'm glad I took the invite. I'm interested enough to keep going with this series, and hope to find I'm longing to know more about the world when this series is completed. And if this was the intent, then well done. It succeeded.

There's a lot to enjoy here. The characters are interesting and easy to enjoy spending time with. I am, in fact, a sucker for a ragtag band of misfits, so I was immediately fond of the Crows when they showed up; and I was interested in Vedra and Daley's stories and didn't mind most of the book being from their perspective. There's a real 'Robin Hood' quality to Flann and his crew, and the two children being the main POV did a surprisingly good job of grounding the story, and allowing us to learn more about what was going on. I can see some people finding them frustrating because, well, they're children. They're more reluctant to act, they don't understand all the intricate details going on around them and they're very clearly swept up by something far bigger than them, but I enjoyed it. They make a good 'heart' for the story, and I think things would be lacking without them.

The plot was set into motion well, and the outcomes felt fitting for the world, which is notably harsh and quite bleak, without making me feel hollow or empty. There's a lot being set up for future books and I'm eager to see how the proverbial dominoes fall when the set up has pay off!

I will be looking forward to the next one!

[Metaphorosis]

2.5 stars, Metaphorosis reviews

Summary
Young Vedra lives alone in an abandoned warehouse, scraping together coins through unreliable prophecy. When the younger Daley comes into her life unexpectedly, they're both thrust into an important task protecting the legitimate heir to the kingdom's fading ruler.

Review
I've enjoyed much of Tad Williams' work, but 'original' is not one of the adjectives that usually comes to mind (with a few exceptions), and that's true here as well. The Splintered Sun draws heavily on Robin Hood and doesn't add a great deal to it.

My copy of The Splintered Sun also gave no indication that this was part of a series rather than a standalone, which made for a confusing read. Only Mr. Williams' norm (series) and the lack of any real progress in the book made me think that it must be intended as a series opener, as Goodreads now seems to confirm. If it's not, this is one very dull book.

'Lack of progress' sums up much of the book. The world is mildly interesting (it's apparently a prequel set in Osten Ard, though I didn't recognize much) and the characters are engaging, but the core plot of the book is very, very thin. During the latter half, I kept trying to figure out why the book had devoted so very much text to such a thin task. The only reason I came up with was that Williams' focus was on establishing characters, and he'd spent very little time on the device he would use to do it. The result was severely underwhelming.

Not all of the character descriptions worked out. One man in particular simply could not be mentioned without (re-)establishing how very large he was. Not as a point of humor, but as simple description. By the tenth time, I was shouting, "We get it; he's big." Sadly, there wasn't a whole lot more to him than that. There are also some logistical improbabilities with the action of the other very large and limited character.

Overall, I wasn't impressed. I've read many of Williams' other series, but this is one that I won't be following. If the rest is as dull as the opener, I can't really recommend that anyone should.

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

[James]

I thought this book was an excellent addition to the world of Osten Ard. It is set in the period of time between Brothers of the Wind and The Dragonbone Chair and while prior knowledge is not strictly necessary there are a lot of easter eggs that the reader will not get without the prior knowledge. This book, I believe was going to be a standalone and is now a series with the final number of books unknown to me, but there will be at least one more. I thought that while there is, of course, more to the story this novel ended at an appropriate point. The prose of Tad Williams continues to be excellent and I am thrilled to just spend more time in his world. 


If this was a new author or one that I had never read before I would give this book five stars, but it gets a four star rating for a number of reasons which I will go into detail about. I thought that the characters were interesting, but not as much as previous installments. Although this is a retelling of the Robin Hood myth the two main characters were of a boy named Daley and a girl named Vedra. Daley loves to explore large castles and other such areas and is very taciturn. He honestly reminded me a lot of Simon from the original trilogy, but I felt more of a connection with the original type of character. I thought, while Vedra is very capable and does things out of her comfort zone, she is very passive and did pale beside other characters that Tad has done in the past; like Nezeru (from The Last King…series). While Norns are hinted of being involved somehow there isn't much information about the wider conflict between them and the Sithi and that is something that I've always found most interesting about books in this world. Without that conflict given more emphasis the stakes don't seem as high.


I do want to leave things on a positive note so I will say that the reader will see one of my favorite characters from Brothers of the Wind and I really enjoyed being delightfully surprised to thee this person again. I felt my interest was kept throughout this novel and that is getting to be increasingly difficult for me nowadays. Tad continues to weave stories that fascinate me and allow me to escape into. I think it's admirable that the author is trying to do something a little different, even if I enjoyed what was done previously more. I look forward to the sequel!

[Brent]

I got an early copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

It is no secret I'm a big fan of Tad Williams and specifically a big fan of anything and everything he has written in the Osten Ard universe. That is why I was so excited to hear that he was returning to Osten Ard this time with a prequel set in Hernystir with a very Robinhood inspired character named Flan Alderwood who runs a group of outlaws called The Crows. It's set about 300 years (I think) before Memory Sorrow and Thorn. The story follows a boy and a girl who get caught up in the political schemes of factions trying to control Herynstir and the Crows. The world and characters are all very rich and fleshed out which you would come to expect from Tad. Even very minor characters like Liam are very memorable. Although the book is quite long it never ally felt too draggy or slow for me except for maybe a small bit right in the middle. There were always interesting things happening or ways in which the magic of the world is being explored. And Tad's writing/prose is just fantastic which makes the pages go by easily as you get immersed in the world and story. All of those elements are executed at a very high level. Then why was this not a 5/5 or book of the year contender?

The simple answer...the plot. It's just very basic for how long this novel is. It was 848 pages on my kindle (assume far less in hardcover) and while I was always immersed the overarching plot itself wasn't as engaging as it could be. Sure we develop the characters and learn more about the world and it's all very interesting, but the main plot that drives the book seems to have a very limited scope and low stakes compared to the big epic stories of Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn or Last King of Osten Ard. There are hints of maybe something larger at work that will hopefully be explored in the next two books of the trilogy but you don't get hardly any of that here. I even expected some sort of epilogue to reinforce those elements and there wasn't one. Nonetheless it was still a great reading experience and I recommend it to fans of Tad, Osten Ard, or generally fans of epic fantasy. You honestly don't have to have even read any of the previous Osten Ard books in order to read this and it won't spoil anything for those books other than how the magic works. Definite recommend.

[Y.N.]

Thank you to Netgalley and DAW for the eARC

Before “The splintered sun” I hadn’t yet come around reading Tad Williams. I am familiar with the name of course, being in the fantasy bubble, and Williams a well established author. Needless to say, I was curious to read one of his new works as an introduction to his writing.

Let me strat with saying that, as it could be expected,”The splintered sun” has a really classic, 90’s/early 2000’s feel. It’s in the big cast, how the story is exposed in the first few chapters. In the cast of characters too (band of bandits, kid on her own, prince, you know the drill). And, more importantly to readers more familiar to the current strand of fantasy, it is slow paced. Things happened from the beginning of course, but don’t expect quick actions and high stakes straight away. This also means it took me quite a while to really get the book’s direction, plot wise and why it was happening. In the end, I am left a bit unsure, still. Maybe it is because this is the first book in a series, and in the vein of 90’s fantasy, first book tends to be there to set the place, but I’ll admit I prefer tomes that have their own resolved objectives in big fantasy like that.

At its core, this book revolves around two children, bandits, and more centrally, a political intrigue, with assassinations and stuff. Again, very cool, but not my preferred type of fantasy, having read too many of them, I feel like. That being said, the cast of characters is colourful and engaging, the plot has enough layers to sustain the book’s length. Personally, I found it pretty simple, but it might be convoluted enough to be dense for some readers.

As for the writing, nothing to say there, it works well. There’s a few nice twists of phrases, good ways to inform the readers about the world without being too indo-dumpy. It’s great! By the way, you really need to be interested in the world to read this book, otherwise you’ll probably get bored quite easily, if you feel like there is little purpose to the intrigue in the end.

Recommending this to readers who love big sprawling worlds, big cast of characters and have a sense of nostalgia for classic fantasy.

[Drashti Patel]

Thank you to DAW Books and NetGalley for the advance copy. All opinions are my own.

I'll admit upfront: I've never read a single Tad Williams book before this one, and I had no history with Osten Ard going in. So I can't speak to how this compares to The Dragonbone Chair or the rest of the saga, but I can tell you that as a first entry point, it worked. I never once felt lost or like I was missing some crucial piece of lore I should have already known.

The Splintered Sun is set three hundred years before the earlier books, in a kingdom thrown into chaos as its old king's health fails and rival factions circle the throne. At the centre of it is Flann Alderwood, a Robin Hood type leading a band of misfit outlaws called the Crows, though the book spends much of its time with two younger characters, a boy with quick hands and a girl coming into her own strange abilities, whose lives get pulled into the political mess around them.

What struck me most was how fully realised the world felt for a first read. There's a lot going on: a large cast, competing loyalties, a slow burn of political tension building underneath the more adventurous, swashbuckling moments. It's clearly the kind of book that rewards patience, and there are stretches where the pacing eases off in favour of atmosphere and character work rather than constant momentum. I didn't mind that, but readers looking for nonstop action might feel it drag a touch in places.

The characters are the real draw here. Flann has a charm to him that avoids feeling like a stock archetype, and the two younger leads carry a surprising amount of emotional weight for characters just starting their journey. By the end, I found myself invested enough to want the next book, even without any prior attachment to this world.

I'm giving this 4 stars. A strong, atmospheric start that made me a new fan of this world, even if a couple of the slower stretches kept it from being a full five for me.

[Samantha]

Thank you, NetGalley and Tad Williams, for the ARC of The Splintered Sun in exchange for my review. My opinions are my own.

The Splintered Sun is fantasy in its true form: a group of misfits going on an adventure. There are a lot of characters to keep track of and shifting points of view – all in third person. It did take me a little while to keep track of the characters, but once I did, the rest of the story came together for me. Flann Alderwood is a Robin Hood character type – he reminds me of Men in Tights Robin Hood. When Vedra (one of the other MCs) met him, it was so entertaining that I couldn’t help but laugh. While serious in plot, the narrative often feels carefree – like the characters understand the stakes are high, but that doesn’t mean everything they say or do has to be serious. Flann and his merry men and women learn of a plot against the ailing king’s legitimate heir, Ewain, and take it upon themselves to help the kingdom while also taking in two young orphans: Vedra and Daley. Vedra is a seer who learns more about her abilities as the story develops. Daley generally does what he wants – which usually involves climbing (towers, trees, etc.) and taking things that don’t belong to him, but he is only ten. Vedra and Daley offer a fresh perspective to the adventure.

The Splintered Sun is well-written and highly descriptive. Each character is unique and has a role in the story. While I enjoyed the story and feel like this is a great addition to the fantasy genre, I didn’t completely escape reality. When I read high fantasy, I want to be completely immersed – to completely forget that the world the author created isn’t real. This story didn’t quite do that, but it’s still a good story. It is definitely for readers who already read Tad Williams and other high fantasy work.

✅Found family
✅Robin Hood vibes
✅World-building
✅Multi-3rd Person POV
✅Fantasy Quest

[Tanya]

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc of The Splintered Sun!

Tad Williams is one of those authors that I honestly don't know how I've never read a book by him. So when an Osten Ard prequel was announced — and an Osten Ard prequel with queer characters, at that! — I was excited to jump in. So with that in mind, I'm sad to say that I'm DNFing the novel after roughly 100 pages, or at the 18% mark.

Reading The Splintered Sun, I got the impression that the author doesn't trust the reader to understand or remember things. The narrative overexplains things. Information is repeated, often on the same page or the next one. Conversations get repeated with different characters. In conversations, we get the dreaded info-dumping of information the listener already knows, in the vein of "your relative, who is called X but also happens to be Y and Z, is...". On top of that, characters' emotional responses and decision-making often felt overly simple. I'm not saying that the book is YA, but the writing style felt better suited to a YA novel than an adult one.

It probably doesn't help that so many of the major characters in the first 100 pages are children. We have a 14-year-old fortune-teller, a 10-year-old orphan, and a teenage prince and his elderly advisor. The one major character that so far doesn't fit this mould is Flann, the attractive, gay Robin Hood figure. But I'm disappointed to say that rather than finding him funny or charming as is clearly intended, he just annoyed me.

It also struck me that there are multiple physically disabled characters who are treated as either grotesque and bad or as nasty but worthy of pity. Admittedly, I haven't finished the novel, and so far, all these descriptions come from a single child's point of view. I haven't seen where the author is going with this theme of disability. But the depiction so far feels incredibly outdated. I hope that it improves as the novel continues.

[Jensen McCorkel]

Rating 3.5

Beautifully immersive, with rich worldbuilding and a compelling cast of memorable characters.

The novel's greatest strength is its worldbuilding. Hernystir feels vividly alive, with its layered history, folklore, and political tensions enriching every chapter. Tad Williams has a remarkable ability to create settings that feel ancient and lived-in, and that talent shines throughout this book. The new cast is equally engaging, particularly Flann Alderwood, whose outlaw charm makes him an easy character to root for. Vedra and Daley each offer distinct perspectives, giving the story a broader scope than a traditional single-hero narrative.

That said, the novel spends a considerable amount of time laying the groundwork for future installments, which occasionally slows the pacing. While I appreciated the immersive attention to detail, there were stretches where the momentum lagged, and I found myself wishing the plot would move forward more quickly.

Even so, Williams' prose is thoughtful and evocative, and the blend of political intrigue, folklore, and subtle magic kept me invested throughout. The conclusion is satisfying, though it feels more like the opening chapter of a much larger saga than a fully self-contained adventure. Readers who enjoy richly imagined epic fantasy with unforgettable characters and expansive worldbuilding will find plenty to love in The Splintered Sun.

Overall, The Splintered Sun is a strong beginning to a new chapter in the world of Osten Ard. Longtime fans will appreciate the fresh historical perspective, while newcomers will find it an inviting entry point into one of fantasy's most enduring settings. It's a rewarding return to a beloved world and leaves me eager to see where the series goes next.

[Benny The Bookie]

I want to thank NetGalley and Daw Books for this arc in exchange for my honest review. It was a pleasure to be able to revisit an author that was a must read for me decades ago when I first discovered the Dragonbone Chair. This is an enjoyable traditional epic fantasy, but it is flawed, as a large number of epic fantasy novels have a problem with a long quest with enjoyable characters, but no payoff at the end where it was not worth the many hours invested in reading a 500 plus page novel.

We have two homeless children, Vedra, ability to tell the future by visiting a another dimension, and Daley, a thief that is happiest climbing tall towers, who become involved in a plot to stop the overthrow of the rightful heir to the kingdom in a very Tolkien inspired world. They will go on a journey where they will meet a band of woodland outlaws, that would have been happy in Sherwood Forest, their flamboyant leader Flann Alderwood and later a immortal that lives in a magical house.

Overall, the novel brought back those nostalgic feelings I had when I first discovered the Lord of the Rings as youngster, but the novel never had that moment where I was truly invested in the story to where I couldn’t put the novel down. Great fantasy novels have that moment where you cannot put it down, and you don’t feel guilty for the number of hours you spend reading it or the lack of sleep when you stay up late to finish the novel and pay for it the next morning when you have to get up for work. This novel is not that. A good traditional fantasy with themes and characters that are all too familiar where when you finish the novel, you start to feel guilty for all the hours you spent reading it and looking for something better.

[Michael Price]

Tad Williams has mastered his craft with his words in telling a story. Granted, I have only read Memory Sorrow and Thorn, I still have so much left to read with him... But Splintered Sun was great.... but in Tad form, a bit too long.

Splintered Sun takes place in Osten Ard many years before MST. You can read this book without any prior knowledge of his other works but I believe MST is recommended. This book does meander at times with it's plot progression, but in that time, we are getting to know our characters and by the end you will care for each and every character in the the group. A lot of the plot beats and evens you have probably already read before if you are well read in the fantasy genre but that's not a downside, Tad can throw his own punches and they land more times than not (looking at you cliche Antagonists). I don't know if you call it a trope but there is a part in the book where the party breaks up and I feel like that is where most of the padding of the story is but I understand it's necessary.

While reading the book, I was getting fairytale vibes and really could only picture Flann and the crew as Robin Hood, but Flann is the stand out for me and I think he will for others as he is very personable. I also really enjoyed my time with the children protagonists in the story and the teachings and challenges that had to overcome.

Overall, I highly recommend this to someone who wants to get sucked into a world and feel part of a outlaw group.

Thanks Netgalley and Daw for providing an E-ARC!

[Rustic Reads]

Rating: 3.5/5 (rounded up)

This one for me is very hard to rate, since reading Tad William's previous books in the Osten Ard Saga, I feel like each series so far feels like just one long book... especially Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn for me. And this one was supposed to be a standalone, but it got longer and ended up being a duology, let's just say, series.

This is the first part of the Flan's Crows series and we mostly follow Vera and Daley, or at least they're the one that evolved the most at the end. We also follow other members of the Flan's Crows, Ewain - the legitimate heir, and well, the illegitimate ones.

I honestly enjoyed the very start of this book and the events that lead to our main characters meeting together. But the last few chapters feels a little bit too fast paced, only to have a downtime at the very last chapters. It feels like it's there because, once again, this standalone became two books, so far. I was a bit wary how the pacing of the second book would start.

Despite that, this one is a very interesting addition to the Osten Ard saga. I might re-read and I feel I'll appreciate this better once this series is finished. Unfortunately the appendix for this book is not yet released, so I actually ended up searching some names of persons and even places, in case they were mentioned already in the previous Osten Ard books... and unsurprisingly they are.