Futility of Defense

 

Futility of Defense by Bryan Cole
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is much more a fantasy of battles than Cole’s first book, Beginning of Arrogance. This is a book of ancient mythological gods. Pacifist gods, even humorous gods, and a dark god wanting power over all the surrounding land and sea. Huge atrocious monsters come from the sea and land to destroy the population. And as always, we have a traitor. Can Krell and his champions find the traitor before the village and all of its inhabitants are obliterated?

Battle strategy is the highlight here. The Champions, even the town folk, spend much time fighting to save their lives and their town. Some conflicts are victorious and some fail. Sounds very much like war, doesn’t it? The author has still created a fantasy. Some soldiers die yet some are lucky enough to have a conjuror bring them back to life. A drunken curmudgeon-like high priest uses strong magic to help them live. Magic might help in battle but still, only the strong and the clever survive.

The writer has added some real-life emotions that the champions of the gods might feel. Well…maybe not real life as this is after all a fantasy :) but emotions that plague or touch us every day. It has a different kind of humor than the first book. Even my favorite character, Krell, is portrayed as quite innocent in the ways of life. Strong and sure of himself, he still proves to be somewhat backward in the understanding of love, naïve even. Bryan Cole keeps us in suspense about this throughout his book.

This is not a stand-alone. I don’t think the reader could understand and appreciate the personalities of the characters without getting to know them in the first book. The bantering and interplay and fun that I loved in the first book is missing somewhat in Futility of Defense. It will be interesting to see what the flavor of the author’s next book tastes like. I do hope Krell and his many friends still exist. The characters and the excellent editing are what made both of these fantasy books so easy to read.


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