Review: Age of Iron by Angus Watson

Posted September 24, 2014 by Charlotte in Reviews / 0 Comments

Age of Iron by Angus Watson

I received this book for free from Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Review: Age of Iron by Angus WatsonAge of Iron by Angus Watson
Series: Iron Age #1
Published by Orbit on September 9, 2014
Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Historical
Pages: 520
Format: Paperback
Source: Publisher
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Legends aren't born. They're forged.
Dug Sealskinner is a down-on-his-luck mercenary travelling south to join up with King Zadar's army. But he keeps rescuing the wrong people.
First, Spring, a child he finds scavenging on the battlefield, and then Lowa, one of Zadar's most fearsome warriors, who's vowed revenge on the king for her sister's execution.
Now Dug's on the wrong side of that thousands-strong army he hoped to join ­- and worse, Zadar has bloodthirsty druid magic on his side. All Dug has is his war hammer, one rescued child and one unpredictable, highly-trained warrior with a lust for revenge that's going to get them all killed . . .
It's a glorious day to die.

On the very first page of reading, I thought that Age of Iron was going to be a good even excellent read. But like the phrase never judge a book by its cover, you should also never judge by the first page.

It’s not that it is badly written or that there is a poor story with obvious plot holes. On the whole these were are quite good. The thing that annoyed me and pulled my rating down from 4*s was the sweary language used and the amount of times people had to go to the loo. Also the overuse of women as sexual objects and the graphic use of violence against children. No I am not a prude but this added nothing to the story. Prehaps it was meant to shock the reader, prehaps it was meant to make the story feel more real? Maybe I am being too fussy? Whatever it was meant to be doing it didn’t do anything for me.

Age of Iron is quite slow at the beginning. There is a lot of information required and a lot of characters to introduce, especially as the story is told from multiple perspectives. And while each person has an individual story they slowly merge together.

The three main characters – Dug, Lowa and Spring – are people you can care about and hope will succeed in their quest. While the three seem unlikely companions, coming together out of need, they do fit nicely with one another.

Age of Iron is an adventure story where revenge and comradeship go hand in hand. Add some violence, a small amount of magic and you end up in a difficult situation which leads to a heroic outcome.

Angus Watson can be proud of his debt novel. It is good and it is enjoyable, just it isn’t quite my cup of tea. Which to be honest is a great pity.

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