Farilane: The Rise and Fall, Book 2

There are no more words to use. I have always loved to read and am a writer myself. I have read hundreds of books and none had made me cry at the end until now. This is a beautifully written book with a unique and accessible heroine, which and of itself makes it wonderful, but more importantly it stands nearly alone in modern popular writing as a book that deserves its place in the hall of fame both for the fun and nonstop adventure and its underlying themesI won’t spoil it for you but I will thank you Mr. Sullivan, not just for all the hours I have spent with your many characters but for giving us this one and never taking the easy path.

I have enjoyed most of Michael's books very much. I have read all the series except the next one in this series. However, I think this is his best work so far. The storyline, with, and humor make it one of my top 3 favorite books.

I miss the funny side of his stories but otherwise it's still a good read

The beginning was slow to me, and it took me a few chapters to start to get into the story. Overall I feel the story was a good one, but also feel like it was unfair in the end to Farilane. I understand the reasoning behind what happened, but she was a great character and deserved a better life with someone who would actually love her.

I read so much that I rarely cry when reading, but this one sucker punched me. Its excellent. Highly recommend. 😭

Wow. So good. I’ve read all of the Ryria books and all of the Legends of the First Empire. This one was by a long shot my specific favorite. While it doesn’t match my love for Royce and Hadrian as characters, it’s very very close. So well done. Love the humor. The wittiness was so enjoyable. Thank you for a wonderful read!

M. Sullivan continues to improve his literary skills with every book he writes. Sadly, he decided to use with the “hero dies in the end” paradigm for this novel. No one enjoys having the main character die so I wonder why he would choose do this. I suspect one reason was he wanted to test his writing skills to make a successful “dead hero” novel. And another was he knew he could write it and it would still be successful given the large number of readers committed to this series. So why not?I enjoyed the book though not as much as any of his previous works. It seemed shallow. I suspect that this is due to only developing one character and one perspective in detail where as his previous novels had multiple developed characters making them more complex and more satisfying. Between decreased character development and having his main character die, this has to be his poorest novel to date despite his obvious growth in the craft of writing.So, even though I enjoyed it, I am disappointed.

The prior book in this series, Nolyn, took me a while to read. I felt like that book took a while to get moving and I wasn't as interested in the characters until closer to the end of the story. This book is the opposite of that and I tore through it in less than a week. Farilane herself is perhaps the most entertaining and fun character (I hesitate to say "protagonist" because I've concluded a different character is what I guess you could call the "overall protagonist") Michael J. Sullivan has introduced since his original Riyria Revelations series. She has immense personality and that factor is a major reason why I found this book as enjoyable as I did. I didn't find the characters in Nolyn to be nearly as interesting. I've read all the books set in the world of Elan and I'd rate this one as by far the most entertaining one since the first few.With that said, the ending is brutal and wrenching. Absolutely brutal. It doesn't take away from my enjoyment of the book overall as a whole, but I was still disappointed in the ending for a whole host of reasons. I don't want to give any spoilers because that would seriously ruin the story for anyone who hasn't read the book yet, so I won't say more than that.

I cannot stop reading the fabulous stories by Michael J Sullivan. The worlds and characters he gives us in The Revelation, Ryria and ‘Ages’ series are the most beautiful tales of adventure, love and magic. Farilane is just one of his creations you will fall in love with.

In typical Michael J Sullivan fashion, the story is engaging, fun, action packed, and emotional. If you like any of his books, you’ll like this one too.

Michael just gets better and better.Having read all of the Riyria and First Empire books I notice a load of tid-bits but you don't need to have read them to enjoy this. I would however at least recommend reading Nolyn first.As ever Michael J Sullivan crafts characters masterfully and the story is exciting and well paced.The end is just heartbraking. The first book in ages, he wrote the last one to bring me to tears too. (Age of Legend).Without spoilers I can also see this book starting to set up a post-Ryria series, which excites me.I can't recommend this book enough.

Difficile de passer à un autre livre après celui là.A la fois léger et grave, gai et triste, on ne sort pas comme cela d un livre qui rappelle bien une tragédie grecque antique.Un livre à commencer en début de week en car on ne peut plus le lâcher. L écriture de Sullivan est magique ainsi.

A roller coaster of adventure with hints and surprise and an ending that will wring your heart in two. Mid 2023 and the release of the third book of the series cannot come soon enough.