3/25/25 - Finished Light Bringer, Series
Hello, feasyheads!
Today, I have finished the entire Red Rising and Iron Gold saga. It's not too often I read such long series, but this was just absolutely an awesome read. I should probably start with the review of Light Bringer.
Light Bringer is about Darrow and friends' long journey home after a devastating defeat on Mercury. It focuses a lot more on the character development of everyone, especially Darrow and the antagonist, Lysander. The book is beautifully written. Pierce Brown's writing style especially in the last three books of the series is incredible.
From here on, spoiler alert!
You'd think that being about 90% through the book, you've seen all the action. Not in Light Bringer. One of the most memorable chapters in the series is Hangar 17B. Online, you'll see a lot of hate for Lysander. More than a regular villain would. This is because of what happened there. People thought maybe Lysander would betray the idea of an alliance with the Rim and the Rising, and run back to Atlas. But he betrayed his mentor, his brother, the one who took him in when Darrow decided not to kill him, Cassius, and pin the killings on him.
Here, you really see the character development. How Lysander has become what he feels is necessary in order to keep his power. He plays himself as a noble Gold, looking to shepherd instead of rule, but what he has done speaks otherwise.
The villains in Light Bringer are beautifully made. Each is a different flavor of evil, and is very complex. Seeing the world through Lysander's eyes, you gain quite a lot of insight. There were, I think, four POVs, unlike the five in Dark Age (RIP Ephraim). Did you know Sevro was supposed to be one of them? It ended up not making the cut, and honestly that was really disappointing. I think Sevro is a fan favorite.
This book gets a solid 9 out of ten. It was a beautifully written book, focusing on the small-scale wars rather than the ones with millions of people, unlike Dark Age, and here you really see that waging war for more than a decade has its price.
"The bill comes at the end." Said Lorn au Arcos. This is what he meant!
The series itself:
I love how six books allows the world Brown made to grow and shift, and you see how much everything here changed. Red Rising especially has that dystopian twist, but once I'm far in enough into a series, I don't need it anymore.
I'm not sure if the series is also a space opera, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was. This was one of my more science fictioney reads.
The world Brown created, the Society, is pure genius. Simply so many details about every thing in the world, and it's completely different yet very similar to real life. Sure, there's still Earth, and the 'American Empire" has existed, but times have completely changed. I also love how the series has its own slang.
What I also loved about the series are the constant references to Greece and Rome. Especially Rome. Many of the titles and names are mostly inspired by the Romans, and it's super clear. Many quotes are in Latin. This, you can really tell Brown has put in his research.
The series overall gets a 9.1 out of ten. The setting was amazing, the characters grew and changed, and I love a good space opera. The one thing I disliked about the series was that as it grew, the politics of who is involved with who certainly became a lot harder to keep track of.
That concludes my post for today!
Good morning/afternoon/evening/night,
Uncle Wally
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