First Lords Fury (Codex Alera Book 6) by Jim Butcher

Rating: 5 out of 5

Tavi returns for the final installment of the Codex Alera series. As the title suggests Tavi is now the First Lord and is returning to Alera, with the aide of the Canim, to help fight the Vord who are ravaging the country. Alera is in ruins and the remaining population are cornered and fighting desperately to survive.

The Alera series has been a good fantasy series by Jim Butcher who is best known for his urban fantasy series Harry Dresden. This is not a heavy fantasy like JR Tolkien.

All the characters from the series have returned for this installment and their individual story threads are wrapped up nicely by the end of the book.

The story its self is more focused on the war then previous books. Also Tavi's role as a leader and idea's man is pushed to the limits. There were some amazing battle scenes especially when the furies are used.

A good fun book that is not to heavy going. If you enjoyed the previous five books then this will tie the series off for you nicely.

Princeps' Fury (Codex Alera Series Book 5) by Jim Butcher

Rating 5 out of 5

This is another book hard to review without giving the whole series away. I do not have reviews for the previous four books as I read them pre-blog. Needless to say I loved the series from the minute I started with Furies of Calderon. I was really excited when this book came out but had to wait for the Aust. Dollar to go back up so I could order it from Amazon, then once ordered it took the slow boat via China to get here. The day it got here was a happy day for me (literally I giggled like a tickle me elmo, except I wasn't cute and furry).

Princeps' Fury is the fifth book in the Aleara series and continues the story of Tavi. In Princeps' Fury we follow Tavi across the ocean back to the Canim homeland to help them fight the Vord. Meanwhile Gaius Sextus is rallying the lords of Aleara to fight a growing menace from the lands they call the Waste.

" The icemen fought with savage ferocity, each of them possessed of far more strength than a man - but not more then enraged High Lord, drawing power from the stones of the land itself."

I am probably a smidgen biased when it comes to this book, well anything really by Jim Butcher. I love Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden and Alera series it would take a lot for me to dislike anything Butcher writes. This book is just as action packed and humorous as the other books Butcher writes. I didn’t for a minute feel like Butcher dropped the ball with this book and I just kept turning the pages and managed to devour this book in a night. This series is not a serious epic fantasy novel.

Tavi, Kitai and Max were as always my favorite. I do not think there was much character development as in previous books for these three. But Tavi got to really flex his muscles as a leader and his innate ability for strategic thinking and forward planning. We also got to learn more about the Icemen and Vord which was really interesting. I hope in the next book the Icemen get explored a little further as their story sounds fascinating.

Isana and Amara did not annoy me as much as in previous books. Isana in particular stopped doing the “oh woe is me, Gaius Sextus is an evil bastard and the cause of all my problems” routine, well almost nearly, it did slip in a smidgen.

I would definitely recommend this book but only after reading the first four books. This is not a series you can pick up and read in any order. Each book flows into the other and you would not be able to keep up if you don’t read it in order (plus it would spoil it for you).

In short this book is freaking awesome!!!!

Extra Stuff
Irisih at Ticket to Anywhere also has a review here

If you would like to read a preview click here