Book Review
Title: Dark Star Burning, Ash Falls White by Amélie Wen Zhao (Song of the Last Kingdom Book 2)
Genre: Mythology, Fantasy
Rating: 5 Stars
The opening to Dark Star Burning takes place about a month after the ending of Song of Silver, Flame like Night with Zen and Lan going their separate ways. Zen has headed back to the stronghold of his clan to find out the secrets that the Nightslayer kept, while Lan is heading west in order to find the Godslayer hidden in the desert. The Winter Magician manages to survive his final encounter with Lan but he is seriously injured in the process than ever and even more frustrated because they haven’t come close to capturing the Azure Tiger and the Crimson Phoenix is still missing.
As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, I wasn’t enjoying this one as much as the first and I think that is because we are missing the dynamic between Lan and Zen that I loved in book 1. We are essentially following two different stories that are beginning to overlap now as Zen is at the Palace of Eternal Peace where he has been learning about his clan’s past and he’s a completely different character from book one. It is hard to tell how much of the anger Zen has is his and how much comes from the demon but we can clearly see that Lan has much more control over her demon than Zen does which is something brought up several times in book one. Meanwhile, Lan and the others are heading through the desert to get to Nakkar in order to find the Yue clan and direction to Shaklahira, the Forgotten City of the West to find Godslayer. The stories start to overlap here since Zen discovers the secret his clan had has been sealed by the Crimson Phoenix and he needs that Demon God to remove it and he believes that it is somewhere in the desert where Lan and the others are.
As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, I really liked the dynamic of the side characters and seeing Lan and Zen as two sides of the same coin but the best thing about book one was the dynamic between Lan and Zen and nothing has replaced that so it feels a bit lacking right now. Honestly, I’m not sure if it is because book one had so much action packed in and this one is moving at a slower pace or because the character dynamics are really different but it feels like a lot of the time, nothing is happening and what is happening feels exactly like book one. That being said, the plot is moving forward a little as Lan has managed to get the location for Godslayer from the Yue clan without the assistance of Tai and Dilaya but she has had another run in with Zen and the Winter Magician, which is starting to feel a little repetitive but I am hoping that the action kicks in again soon as we see the build to the finale start.
As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, I was getting very worried since this book seems to be suffering from middle book syndrome, where nothing is really happening and it is only drawing the story out for the third book. If that isn’t the case then I think the ending is going to be extremely rushed and unsatisfactory since we are halfway through the book and Lan hasn’t even got Godslayer yet, the Winter Magician has only appeared once and Zen hasn’t completed any of his goals. However, considering that Zen plans to go to war with the Elantian, reestablish the Ninety-Nine clans and much more I can see this being a trilogy because Amelie Wen Zhao can’t possible wrap this up nicely with only half the book remaining. We do also have a new character in Hong’yi, the Royal Prince who has been in hiding since the fall of the Imperial family and for good reason. The reason is because Shaklahina houses not only Godslayer but the Crimson Phoenix since it is bound to Hong’yi and yet we are aware that Zen needs the Crimson Phoenix to undo the seal of his clan’s history book with the instructions to summon the dead which I think Hong’yi isn’t going to do. I predict that Lan will get between them since Zen isn’t the same and Lan hates unnecessary death.
As we cross into the second half of the novel, I was getting pretty bored since nothing is really happening except travelling and learning. There haven’t been any major conflicts and even the minor ones have lasted a page or two at most. The only thing keeping me going at the moment is the characters and the mystery of what Godslayer actually is and if it actually works. Lan very quickly comes to learn the secret that Hong’yi has been keeping as his family has an ability that allows them to control and manipulate the qi of the mind, allowing them to create illusions in the minds of the people they use it on. Lan very easily counters this with the power of the Silver Dragon, Hong’yi around this time proposes to Lan asking her to be his empress because they both wield demon gods and she agrees in order to get the information she wants out of him.
It is around this time that Dilaya informs her that Tai has gone missing and the secret behind controlling the demon gods. Tai, Lan and Zen all find the river of the dead where the golden lotus seeds grow and consuming these seeds allows the person to control a demon god but like the power of the gods, these seeds come at a price, one which Zen and Hong’yi were both willing to pay but Lan was not. By the time everything comes to a head, Lan manages to uncover what the Godslayer is from Hong’yi’s mind and tries to use it to destroy the Crimson Phoenix but it is incomplete, allowing Hong’yi to escape. However, Zen is willing to give Lan the information she needs to perform the technique which his clan kept secret for generations if she uses it on him when the time comes in order to sever the demon god from him but his life might be forfeit and Lan would face the same fate since she changed the bargain her mother made with the Silver Dragon.
With only around 80 pages left and the Azure Tiger still unaccounted for and the Elantians still hunting down Lan and Zen, I definitely think this is going to be a trilogy since I don’t think everything can be tied up in less than 100 pages. I honestly stand corrected, everything I thought up until this point has been proven wrong. This is only a duology and that final battle and resolution of the story brought me to tears especially the epilogue. Despite my reservations, Amelie Wen Zhao was able to bring everything together in these last 100 pages, not only raising the stakes to extreme levels but bringing so many smaller storylines to their conclusions in ways I was delighted with. Overall, this was a brilliant duology and reading the books back to back honestly broke my heart especially the ending. The only thing I wanted more from was the relationship between Lan and Zen since they don’t get to spend much time together but I think that makes the ending even more bittersweet. Highly recommended!
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