Hall of Smoke: A Book Review

Intensely emotional, with lying gods, and uncertain enemies, Hall of Smoke by H.M. Long is an extraordinary adventure with a badass female main character tasked with completing a seemingly impossible mission while still mourning the loss of her people.

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Overview

• Average Rating: 3.73 stars
• My Rating: 4.5 stars
• Genres: Fiction, fantasy
• Descriptors: Adventurous
• Pace: Slow-paced
• CW/TW: ​Graphic: violence, death, grief. Moderate: animal death, genocide, rape. Minor: slavery. See the full list here.

Summary

Hessa is an Eangi: a warrior priestess of the Goddess of War, with the power to turn an enemy’s bones to dust with a scream. Banished for disobeying her goddess’s command to murder a traveller, she prays for forgiveness alone on a mountainside.

While she is gone, raiders raze her village and obliterate the Eangi priesthood. Grieving and alone, Hessa — the last Eangi — must find the traveller and atone for her weakness and secure her place with her loved ones in the High Halls. As clans from the north and legionaries from the south tear through her homeland, slaughtering everyone in their path…