I’ve received, read, and reviewed review copies of books before, either won via random internet giveaways, or through dedicated early reviewer programs. But Scourge of the Betrayer marks the first time an author has personally reached out to me and said, “Hey, would you like a copy of my new book to review?” Normally, I’d be flattered, but also a little wary, having been burned more than a couple of times doing advance reviews of fantasy debuts. In this case, however, by the time Jeff Salyards had emailed me, I had already seen a handful of glowing reviews for the first book in the Bloodsounder’s Arc series, and so in this instance I was flattered and immediately said, “Yes, please!”
And I’m glad I did.
The first thing that jumped out at me when I removed the dust jacket (as I do before reading) was that Night Shade Books went all-out in making this a gorgeous-looking book. The silver inlay on the blue hardcover looks fantastic, and in addition to printing the author name and title on the spine, as per usual, they’re also printed on the front cover, along with the swipe from the dust jacket and a splatter of silver blood in the corner; a second splatter adorns the back cover. It just looks fantastic and immediately makes you think you’re holding something special in your hands.
The story inside is related in the first-person by Arkamondos (“Arki”), an archivist who’s been hired by the Syldoon captain Braylar Killcoin to chronicle the exploits of his mercenary company. The novel starts off with the bookish Arki first meeting Braylar and his crew, and assumes a leisurely pace as the gang gears up for their mission while Arki gets a handle on the company and his place in it. Some might say “slow” instead of “leisurely”—very little happens for the first half or so of the book; it’s mostly downtime at inns or travel across a wide sea of grasslands—but it’s never sluggish; Salyards spends this time developing his handful of characters and the world they inhabit, most of which is just as foreign to Arki as it is to the reader. There are some moments of action, certainly, but the far more numerous and quieter moments are just as compelling. It’s a wise choice by Salyards, I think: by the time the real plot kicks in with all the action and excitement you could hope for, 
you’ve become invested in these characters and the mysteries of their world. And when death comes—and this being the type of book that it is, death will come—I was surprised by just how hard it hits. That kind of emotional connection in a book that runs a scant 250 pages is a rare thing; kudos to Salyards for making each of those pages count.
I’ve seen a number of comparisons to Glen Cook’s Black Company books, and…I dunno, getting compared to Cook is kind of the default thing when you’re talking about first-person military fantasy. Salyards’ book is gritty and bloody and grunt-level and narrated by an archivist, yes, but it has a very different feel for a few reasons. First is Arki’s perspective as an outsider to the Syldoon group: he’s out of his depth in this new world of soldiery and intrigue right alongside the reader. Secondly, although this is very much a fantasy novel, the fantastical elements play little to no role in this book (though presumably they’ll be far more important later in the series.) There are no mages wielding powerful magic in battle here—it’s just swords and crossbows and shields, prowess and guts and determination, and luck. The action is decidedly mundane, and feels that much more visceral and real for it. Finally, though the Black Company is ground-level in scope, there’s still an epic war going on in the background; Scourge of the Betrayer is much more intimate, and though there are, in fact, long-range machinations going on behind the scenes, they feel far more subtle and less immediate.
As mentioned, this is a pretty short book. A lot happens, but not a whole lot happens, if you get my meaning. This is very much just the first act in what should end up at least a trilogy. The book itself doesn’t come to much of a resolution, and the ending is less a cliffhanger than it is “To be continued…” Had this been a 600-page doorstopper, I’d take issue with that; but you know what? I’m perfectly willing to accept it from a tautly-written, shorter book. Two or three more volumes like Scourge should make for a highly-satisyfing series, and should have people saying Salyards’ name like they do Abercrombie’s now. Sign me on for Book Two, because I can’t wait to see where he takes this story. [3.5 out of 5 stars]
Welcome to the first annual Salty Awards! I liked how 
5. Side Jobs by Jim Butcher
The story is told in intriguing fashion: the narrative alternates between Dev’s and Kiran’s perspectives, but where Kiran’s POV is told from a third-person perspective, Dev’s is done in the first-person. It’s a fantastic device, as both characters have secrets they’re trying to keep from the other, and never truly getting inside Kiran’s head means the mysteries surrounding him remain tantalizing. However, the imbalance also means Kiran never quite seems as “real” a character as Dev, but that’s okay, because Dev makes for such a fantastic POV character. Saying he’s basically Han Solo seems kind of unfair, but it’s not entirely off the mark; he’s very much of the smuggler-with-a-heart-of-gold archetype, though his gold is perhaps a tad tarnished. But he’s got a past history and well-defined motivations; Schafer makes him a very real, very three-dimensional person. (Which is not to say Kiran doesn’t have those things, as well—he does. But again, he’s got that slight feeling of removal from the reader that Dev does not.)
So the story starts out following Azoth, a child in the slums of Cenaria City whose dream is to gain the attention of, and become apprentice to, the legendary “wetboy” assassin Durzo Blint. (For those who’ve read Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Shadow, this section of the book totally reminded me of Bean growing up on the streets of Rotterdam; not a big surprise, then, that Weeks specifically mentions Card as an influence in the author interview at the back of the book.) Eventually, of course, Azoth does indeed become Durzo’s apprentice, adopting the new persona of “Kylar Stern” and developing into an efficient assassin. But the difference between an assassin and a wetboy is that a wetboy employs the use of magic to do his job, and as I alluded to earlier, Azoth-now-Kylar has no magical Talent. In Fantasy Cliché land, this merely means that Kylar is a supertalented mage whose abilities don’t readily manifest themselves…and of course that’s what happens here as well.
