An Unclean Strength by Michael McClung: A Book Review

The sword master strives for purity is mistaken. The sword, in its purity, knows only death. The one who masters it must answer the questions it cannot - who, why, when, where, how. No pure thing can answer these questions, or even imagine such questions. The sword is the soul of the master. But it is not the master.

Punished for wanting to know more about his belief, the honorable Brother Caida has been stripped of his honor, his sword - his very soul - melted into a liquid metal. He was labeled as a heretic and was sent to be a slave, a number on a chain.

As for Lady Anya, well there's no stopping her, it seems. She's surviving and she looks good while she does it. However, it does seem like she has bit more than she could chew, and she feels the burden of her vision crushing her.

Mild spoiler: as of book two of this series, Brother Caida and Lady Anya have yet to bang, and that may be the only thing I find disappointing about this story.

I felt like I was holding my breath the entire time I was reading this book. The author has a way of making a person care about his characters - no matter how big or small the role in his story. Even those characters that you should be rooting against, you can't help but feel for them.

I'm a sucker for a villain that I could feel for and I could feel for these Skin Walkers. I mean, I even feel for the numen and that's just a weird force that doesn't like flowers or eggs.

The pace was fast and yet, I still felt like I was waiting for something to start. I guess that's just the nature of the middle book: things happen but it is obviously not the end yet.

I wait impatiently for the next installment where hopefully there will be some banging between Caida and Anya.

Insert suggestive wink here.

Rating: 5/5