*** Warning! Serious Spoilerage for people who haven't read book 4 yet here! ***

I was just scanning my reviews and I came upon a review of 'Rise of the Archmage by my good friend Nicoleta. (Even though she's one of my harshest critics.)

She had a few questions about book 4, which I never really answered. I feel I should, and now I've got nearly 70,000 words of book 5 I perhaps can - so here goes:-

1. - First of all how did the velkreath even get in the moat without being seen?! It was broad daylight! They can't have stayed in the water over night and the burning of a person is more important than guarding the city walls? Really?

A: The Verkreath entered the moat through underground tunnels and passageways. The Warren runs beneath Cormaroth and there are places where it's possible to enter the moat from the undercity of Cormaroth. I may expand on this in later books. The King's Way mentioned in book 5 is a part of this network of tunnels for example.

2. - So you made Saul cast a destructive spell so that the Orion's Hand are after him too? Way to complicate things. And really, this guy has the wizardry training of a teenager! Is he self-taught? I bet he is, if he's using his life energy as resource he will never cast spells efficiently. Sorcery 101.

A: Saul's not bad for a human wizard. He's not the best of the best for humans. He's mainly senior at the college because he's old and been there a long time. Comparing him to Brael is unfair because Brael is exceptional. If you were thinking 'martial arts' Saul would be the guy in his fifties teaching Karate at your local primary school and Brael would be Bruce Lee, or Chuck Norris?

3. - Elden Roth's curse is STUPID! There I said it! Not only is it illogical that the only way he can find out information about something he had no previous knowledge of is to sing it, but the lyrics he says are nonsensical and borderline cringe worthy (really did he have to sing about Vexis' attempt at cutting Edgar's testies too?).

A: He has no control over his lyrics. The curse makes him sing. Sometimes he sings things he doesn't like, sometimes he sings things he doesn't understand. The true devastating reality of his curse will be explored later. Imagine if you were a person of power and you were a bit evil, like - on the evil side, and you knew there was a person who had Elden's curse. You might be quite keen on capturing them!

4. - I just like it how they simply talk about killing off the paralyzed assassin in front of them - that they immediately deemed evil and sadistic, way to be quick at labeling people Martyn - and don't even break a sweat. They even suggest shipping her off to become a blind (eyes gouged out) whore. No sweat... she's not a human being or anything! We are the humans, she's just assassinating for the gold, her life is worthless. >.> They finally resort to extracting her memories and leaving her with none... but this also has consequences. The Orion's Hand know how she looks like! Here's a woman that is going to be ambushed at night, raped, tortured then killed and she'll have no FUCKING IDEA what for!

A: The threats were not real. The companions were trying to trick Olwyn into lowering her mental defences. To be fair they didn't kill her. She actually makes a return in Book 5 and ends up being something of a social climber. I will say no more, but you haven't seen the last of Olwyn.

5. - Why are they so hellbent on rescuing Kaya and Lindie! Why the hell do they go out of their way to do that. Here's an alternative example: George R.R. Martin gave subtle hints as to who Jon Snow's parents are so that his death can't be ruled out as merely just like any other death in his books. He is important to the plot, that's why his parentage has been expanded upon. In this book, what is the importance these two girls have in the novel?! Why do they NEED to be saved?!

A: They didn't really need to be saved. The companions had obviously saved them initially because they thought they COULD and the didn't want two innocent people to be burned at the stake. Once they'd saved them, they had an emotional investment in them. There'll be more of the girls later.

6. - Where's the plot? Is the plot only them going from Cormaroth to Votrex's Holt, on their way doing random rescues and good deeds? Cuz that's what they did in the first book too.

A: Apologies for this. I intended this book to take the companions to the Temple of the Mad God, but it was over-running. So I needed to wrap up the book and give it a new title. This book was really about Brael recovering his powers and Vashni returning to Eldenizar. That was the focus of the book. It also introduced Vexis and Fox, who become key characters in book 5.

7. - The narrator has a few awkward tendencies: interrupting fight scenes to randomly dump in some information I bet no one will keep in mind by the end of the paragraph; when shifting perspecting from a focus character to another the narrator sounds like that 50's narrator from Legend of Korra (And here we have Kaya and Lindie casually strolling to Briem. Back at the group's camp Saul is...) Seriously? What is he a news anchor?

A: This is something I ought to address. To be fair the fight at the end of the book IS quite long. Maybe even TOO long, but they were evenly matched so,...


8. - The characters are SO CHATTY! My god, I've never seen so many words come out of a collective group of characters with SO LITTLE relevant material to say.

A: Yep, they are a chatty bunch at times!

Random sparknotes:
1. - Vashni = next Candidate for my one punch list.

A: Vashni ends up playing a very different dynamic in the next book. She finds herself quite subdued and on the back foot for much of book 5.

2. - Was literally made Korhan the one who killed Thrax, just so he can be called Dragonslayer?

A: Korhan is doing his best! He's headstrong, too concerned about his honour and stuff and doesn't think things through. He DOES change, he has a rough ride ahead of him, but he does improve eventually. Though I do appreciate the concern - for a hero his win/loss ration on duels is pretty awful! :(

3. - Are they seriously having a talk about what's considered an acceptable procreating couple? >.>

A: Well, this is a flavour of the books! Though to be fair there's less of this in book 5.

4. - On Elden Kissing Korhan: "Ohhh you sneaky, you're gay, aren't you? Oh my... No. Wait. He's bi."

A: He is! And very promiscuous with it too!

5. - And are they SERIOUSLY TALKING ABOUT GENETICS NOW?! X(

A: Yup, blame Brael. The fantasy fiction worlds first scientist.

Well hope that clears a few things up! If not the answers might be in one of the remaining books in the series.