‘In the Shadow of their Dying’ – Michael R. Fletcher & Anna Smith Spark (Grimdark Magazine)


Page Count: 172 Pages

Apart from my regular trips to a certain war-torn universe of the far future, the Grimdark thing kind of passed me by. Unless things, outside my reading, have reached a point where I’m reading Grimdark stuff and just haven’t noticed…? Possibly, I don’t know. By the time I get to the party, everyone else has already gone and I’m trading slightly embarrassed looks with the guy sweeping up. But anyway… ;o)

I’d been hearing a lot of good things about ‘In the Shadow of their Dying’, mostly via ‘Spells & Spaceships’, and resolved to be into this book right from the start. Okay, when the paperback was released, you know what I mean…

I should note, before I start, that I’ve never read anything by Michael Fletcher or Anna Smith Spark (and I may need to do something about that now) so honestly, I’ve got no idea where one’s writing ends and the other begins. Apologies then, if I miss something really obvious. And on that note...

The third best assassin. A second rate mercenary crew. One terrifying demon.

As Sharaam crumbles under siege, a mercenary crew hires an assassin to kill the king. For Tash, it’s a chance at glory—to be the best blade in the dark Sharaam has ever known. For Pitt, it’s a way to get his cutthroat crew past the Tsarii siege and out of this hellhole, maybe even with some gold to their name. For Iananr the Bound One, it's a dream of shadows and human blood.

Some books are happy just to tell you their story while others go a little bit further, immersing you in the setting so that you can live the story. ‘In the Shadow of their Dying’ is very much in the latter camp but takes things even further by holding absolutely nothing back, not one bit. You may have read about a few sieges, you may even feel like one of those books helped you live the siege. Well, all I can say to that is read this book and have your mind changed.

Sieges are monotonous, it’s kind of the whole point, at least until something happens to break the siege one way or the other. And that monotony is truly soul destroying as it’s basically unending, relentless atrocities and misery. Part of the reason it took me a little longer to finish this book is because Fletcher and Smith Spark capture the resulting despair so well. The city of Sharaam is being ground down through relentless bombardment and its citizens suffer the same fate, seeing this horror at first hand. And us as readers? Fletcher and Smith Spark make sure that we see it too and yep, I had to take little breaks just to cheer myself up a little bit. It’s harrowing stuff but I still kept coming back and I’m glad I did because just when you think it couldn’t possibly get any worse for the city, Fletcher and Smith Spark step it up another gear and the threat increases exponentially. And the great thing is that because things are just shit already, you accept this new development as the logical next step and carry on reading. It’s masterfully done.

Have I mentioned that there’s a story lurking in amongst all the horror? No? Well there is and it complements the ‘background horror’ perfectly. War brings out the worst in people and sometimes, the least competent people have the most grandiose plans. Watching Tash, Pitt and the others constantly try and stay one step ahead of the game is easy to do here as not only are they thoroughly unlikeable, they’re not very good at what they do either, reliant on luck more than any skill. I could sympathise with their predicament but I’ll be honest, I wanted them to trip up so badly… Now there’s a combination guaranteed to keep me reading.

It wasn’t just them though, Iananr the Bound effortlessly takes centre stage every time she steps onto the page, both in the horror she brings to those pages and the relentless approach she brings to the hunt. It’s not just that though, seeing Iananr’s viewpoint of events (while she wreaks the worst kind of havoc) is just haunting and the way it ties into the main thrust of the book… I don’t want to spoil the book, so I won’t, but, wow… That was amazing, absolutely left me stunned.

And that’s where I’ll leave this post, other than to say that you must read ‘In the Shadow of Their Dying’, it is just superb. I don’t normally do ‘Best Of’ lists anymore but I want to now, just so I can put ‘In the Shadow of Their Dying’ at the top.

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