Blog Tour: The Savage Rebellion Trilogy by Matt Wallace, ft. Savage Crowns (#3)

Today I'm thrilled to share my stop on the blog tour for the latest and final installment book in the Savage Rebellion, Savage Crowns! I have been absolutely loving this trilogy, and I'm pleased to say that Savage Crowns is the perfect conclusion to what has been an incredible story. Below you'll find some information about Savage Crowns, a short review, some praise for the entire series, and a bit of information about the author. Huge thanks to Cassidy Sattler at Gallery Books for including me on this blog tour and sending me copies to read!

ABOUT THE BOOK:
Title: SAVAGE CROWNS
Author:  Matt Wallace
Pub. Date: June 13th, 2023
Publisher: Gallery/Saga Press
Pages: 336
Find it: Bookshop.org | Amazon

SYNOPSIS:

"The final installment in Hugo Award–winning author Matt Wallace’s epic and spellbinding Savage Rebellion trilogy about a utopian city with a dark secret—and the underdogs who will expose it, or die trying.

The final war for the nation of Crache has begun.

At the helm of the people’s rebellion is Evie, the Sparrow General. She has been captured by the Skrian, Crache’s vicious army, and is being brought back to the Capitol for punishment. But reinforcements are coming for her.

Dyeawan, who has climbed from street urchin to Crache’s highest seat of power through clever schemes and ruthless bloodshed, finds trouble on every front once she arrives. The rebellion approaches, and there are whispers of a martyr within the city who holds enough sway to stage a coup. If she doesn’t act quickly, her rule will be short-lived.

As the women who hold the nation’s future meet each other from different sides of the battlefield, will they be able to find a shared vision of Crache, or will they destroy each other first?"

     Review:

You can find my reviews for the first two books below:
Savage Legion (#1)
Savage Bounty (#2)

The Savage Rebellion has been a whirlwind of a trilogy and Savage Crowns has proved to be an excellent conclusion to the story. I was sorry to have to say goodbye to all of these characters that I've grown to love so much. 

Savage Crowns picks up pretty quickly after all the tumultuous events of Savage Bounty, and if you, like me, ever struggle to remember some of the finer details of previous books then you'll be please to find out that Matt Wallace provides a quick recap at the beginning of this book. This was the perfect refresher before I was ready to get back into this world. 

When I first read Savage Legion, I was immediately captured by the world and characters that Matt Wallace developed. This world and characters have remained just as strong and compelling as they ere from the start, and I loved getting to see their development and individual arcs. This series is packed with some truly incredible women as the leading protagonists and I think Wallace did a consistently wonderful job of showcasing their individual strengths in a variety of ways that really highlighted them as unique people with their own motivations and goals in place. This series also has had abundant representation from the start, including featuring characters with disabilities and queer rep in ways that felt both natural and proud, and this continues into Savage Crowns. 

This book felt the most action-packed out of all of them, which makes perfect sense since everything that the previous two books have been building up to has finally come to fruition. The pacing is a bit faster in this book than previous ones, but it works well for the story and really helped to keep me on the edge of my seat–I actually ended up flying through this book even faster than I anticipated that I would. I loved how well everything was wrapped up, but at the same time I feel like there is still plenty of possibility for the future if Wallace ever chose to return to this world and/or these characters.

If you haven't had a chance to start reading this series yet, then I highly recommend you pick up Savage Legion and let yourself become immersed in this compelling fantasy series. It's perfect for anyone who loves fantasy with strong characters, an interesting world, and plenty of political intrigue (and especially if you prefer your fantasy <400 pages!). 

So I accidentally took this picture in backwards order for some reason, but regardless of that–how amazing are these covers? I love how bold and strong they are.

Praise for the trilogy:

Praise for Book 1, SAVAGE LEGION: “Impressive tale of swords and super-science [with] multifaceted characterization… Wallace masterfully subverts readers’ expectations, [who] will be left thoroughly satisfied and eager to know what’s to come.” —Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW *

Praise for Book 2, SAVAGE BOUNTY: “Fast-paced action, emotional choices, and non-stop tension through the last page will leave readers immediately clamoring for the trilogy’s final book.” —Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW *

Praise for Book 3, SAVAGE CROWNS: “The captivating finale… features an epic world and showcases hidden power structures, family secrets, and women who believe in a better life for all.” —Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW *

Photo credit:
Edward Earl Norton

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Matt Wallace is the Hugo nominated author of Rencor: Life in Grudge City and the Sin du Jour series, and he won a Hugo Award alongside Mur Lafferty for the fancast Ditch Diggers. He’s also penned more than a hundred short stories in addition to writing for film and television. In his youth, he traveled the world as a professional wrestler and unarmed combat and self-defense instructor before retiring to write full time. He currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife, Nikki (bio from Simon & Schuster).

LINKS: Website | Twitter | Instagram 

Review: Savage Bounty (Savage Rebellion #2) by Matt Wallace

Savage Bounty (Savage Rebellion #2) by Matt Wallace

Gallery/Saga Press

Publication Date: July 20th, 2021

Paperback. 400 pages.

About Savage Bounty:

"The sequel to the acclaimed, spellbinding epic fantasy Savage Legion by Hugo Award–winning author Matt Wallace about a utopian city with a dark secret…and the underdogs who will expose it—or die trying. 

They call them Savages. Brutal. Efficient. Expendable. The empire relies on them. The greatest weapon they ever developed. Culled from the streets of their cities, they take the ones no one will miss and throw them, by the thousands, at the empire’s enemies. If they live, they fight again. If they die, well, there are always more. 

From Hugo Award–winning author Matt Wallace comes the much-anticipated second installment to the “epic fantasy the genre has been waiting for” (Sarah Gailey, Hugo Award–winning author of Magic for Liars)."

*Find my review for the first book, Savage Legion, here. As with all my reviews for sequels, there will be no spoilers for this book and I will try to refrain from including major spoilers from the first book, but there will be some more general spoilers from the first as I discuss, so be warned if you haven't read the first book!*

Savage Legion was one of the most unexpected books I read last year because it was a complete surprise–I won it in a Goodreads giveaway!–without know too much about it and ended up absolutely loving it. Savage Bounty, of course, was therefore one of my most anticipated releases/sequels of 2021, and I had such a fun time with the sequel. This sequel didn't grab me quite as much as the first book, but I think that's just because I had so much fun slowly figuring things out about the world and meeting the characters in the first book. I was also worried about not remembering enough from the first book, but Matt Wallace is apparently a gem because there was a couple page "the story so far" available at the start of the book, which saved me immensely!

The world of the Savage Rebellion series has a “utopian” premise that is not quite as it seems, and I have found the different perspectives on this situations that each character brings one of the most interesting parts of this series. I have particularly liked seeing how each character discovers different aspects of corruption, and how Savage Bounty allows those elements to be explored further and for the characters to really start to push against what is generally the norm. The world-building of this series has also been one that I've really enjoyed discovering as it slowly unfolds more and more over the course of the book, and if I had any complaints it would simply be that I want more of it (which isn't really a complaint because we get plenty)!

We follow the same POVs of Evie, Lexi, and Dyeawan as we did in the first book, as well as one additional smaller new POV from Taru, and I couldn't be happier with these POV choices. Evie continues to kick ass as the new face of the rebellion of the Savages, and I loved watching her grow in this role. Lexi is now a prisoner of a seeming madwoman, but she continuously fights and brainstorms ways to save both herself and others. And for those that love the challenge/trials trope, then you will love Dyeawan's storyline in this book. I won't tell you why she ends up competing in a series of three trials, but it's absolutely worth it to find out and her growth throughout these two books has also been immense and excellently written. Taru was such a compelling side character in the first that I am so pleased to see that they were given some more time on the page. Their storyline in this book was, in some ways, relatively minor, but at the same offered some incredible build up for things that will be occurring in the third book.

The pacing felt a bit steadier and slower in general than the first book, but I felt that that was necessary in order to take a closer look at the characters and set up the storyline for the final book. Savage Legion threw us into the world and took us on a whirlwind journey to discover the main characters, and now Savage Bounty is easing off the gas slightly in order to get us even more acquainted with the characters and their journeys. This is not to say, however, that this book was slow or didn’t have big momentous plot movements, because it absolutely did. I was just as hooked throughout this entire book as I was with the first, and I am constantly excited by how compelling the story and the world itself is. 

The last thing I'll comment on is Wallace's writing style, which I found incredibly engaging and easy to read. It's not that it's overly simplistic, but rather done in a way that makes it easy to fall into the characters and the story. There's a lot of information to learn about the world, the way society runs, how the Planning Cadre works, and more, but the way Wallace introduces everything and incorporates them into the narrative makes it feel more natural and flow well. I never find myself feeling overwhelmed in this book, which only makes things that much more enjoyable to read. 

Overall, I've given Savage Bounty five stars! I've really been loving this series so far and cannot wait to see what's next for these characters and this world. 

Buy the book: Amazon | Indiebound 

Review: Savage Legion by Matt Wallace

Savage Legion (Savage Rebellion #1) by Matt Wallace

Gallery/Saga Press

Publication Date: July 21st, 2020

Hardcover. 498 pages

About Savage Legion:

"They call them Savages. Brutal. Efficient. Expendable. 

The empire relies on them. The Savages are the greatest weapon they ever developed. Culled from the streets of their cities, they take the ones no one will miss and throw them, by the thousands, at the empire’s enemies. If they live, they fight again. If they die, there are always more to take their place. 

Evie is not a Savage. She’s a warrior with a mission: to find the man she once loved, the man who holds the key to exposing the secret of the Savage Legion and ending the mass conscription of the empire’s poor and wretched. 

But to find him, she must become one of them, to be marked in her blood, to fight in their wars, and to find her purpose. Evie will die a Savage if she has to, but not before showing the world who she really is and what the Savage Legion can really do."

Savage Legion is one of the most pleasant surprises of 2020 thus far! I was excited to read Savage Legion and I knew it had a ton of promise, but I had absolutely no idea that I would be hooked almost immediately and that I would love this book even half as much as I ended up. 

Savage Legion switches between three main POV segments. The first follows Evie, a woman who seems undaunted by most things she faces in life and sticks firmly to any task she is given--sometimes with a bit of ruthlessness to it, but mostly just because she's extremely efficient and loyal to what she has been tasked to do. Evie's story begins when she is taken to jail one night and transported to the military front the next day where she becomes a part of the Savage Legion, a group of people who have similarly broken the law and are now being utilized as diversions in battles. This Legion is essentially out first on the battle lines in order to provide a distraction before the trained military arrives. It's both brutal and ingenious at the same time, and I think this setup provided a lot of really interesting possibilities for the plot. (There are also 'blood coins' as a part of this process, an idea that I found particularly interesting, and of course a bit gruesome). Evie's chapters were easily some of the most exciting because you never really knew exactly what was going to happen, and as the story progressed things began to get more and more intense in ways that made it hard for me to stop reading. 

The next person we follow is Lexie, a young woman who is learning how to navigate life as the sole remaining member of her family's Gens after her husband--who had been acting as the public defender for the faction of society that they represent (the lowest of the factions)--goes missing. His whereabouts are unknown, as is whether or not he is even alive, and Lexie must navigate the 'political' landscape on her own while trying to earn the respect of those around her, as well as carefully investigate her husband's disappearance--all while everyone seems to be working against her. I really appreciated Lexie's determination and how she overcomes her fears and uncertainties in order to do what she feels is best for the people she represents, as well as for herself and her husband. She is aided by her bodyguard Taru, who has labeled themselves as Undeclared, meaning that they are non-binary. This world seems to have mixed opinions of the Undeclared, with some finding them 'confusing' and others being perfectly accepting (much like in our own world), and I thought it was a great inclusion on Wallace's part to add a bit more experience and considerations to the book. I also really loved watching Lexie and Taru's relationship develop in this book as each started to have to trust and become more comfortable with the other over the course of the book's events. 

And lastly we follow Dyeawan (aka Slider), an at-present homeless woman whose legs were crushed when she was a girl and who ingeniously gets around by a makeshift wheelchair of sorts in which she can slide around to get places (hence the name 'Slider'). Slider is first introduced on the same night that Evie gets hauled off to jail, but instead of being taken to aid the military in the Savage Legion, Slider is instead whisked off to an unknown place where she works with other scholars under the leadership of a man named Edgar to build and invent new devices, ideas, buildings, etc. for the empire. Slider was one of my favorite POVs to follow because I found the entire premise of where she was and what everyone there was doing so fascinating and full of ideas to explore. I won't say too much about it because I think a lot of it hinges on the experience of discovering for yourself, but Wallace excelled in developing this part of the story and introducing some really neat engineering concepts and executions, as well as introduced us to a lot of really varied and compelling side characters that I really would have loved to spend even more time with. I really enjoyed hearing about what everyone was working on and how Slider was tested for her own skills and fit in with everyone. 

I thought the pacing of Savage Legion was spot on. I've seen a few reviews mention that the pacing felt a bit slow, but I really don't see that from my reading experience. Lexie's chapters were the slowest of the three, but they still had some compelling plot developments and crucial worldbuilding included that I loved learning about. There was a great balance of action, plotting, and character development, and I found myself particularly enjoying the latter two in this book as well, as things just continued to get more and more sinister as the story progressed. There's also a great amount of social commentary present in Savage Legion that felt both timely and compelling. It wasn't done in an overhanded way, but it provided some strong thematic backdrops for a lot of what occurs in this sort of dystopian-esque landscape that is slowly unveiled over the course of the story.

Lastly, I really loved Wallace's worldbuilding, as it seemed to have the perfect blend of complexity and variety, as well as being conveyed in a manner that didn't leave me feeling lost or confused. I actually felt as those I understood this world thoroughly by the end of the book, but there are still plenty of things that I want to explore more and learn more about in future installments. I think that there is a lot of potential in these books for the world to keep expanding outward, both physically and with cultural/etc. developments, and I truly cannot wait to see what's next in this series/trilogy!

Overall, this was an easy (yet unexpected in the best way!) five stars from me! I am a new Matt Wallace fan and I intend to check out some of his backlist titles while I anxious await the next installment in the Savage Rebellion series!

*I received a copy of Savage Legion in exchange for an honest review. This has no effect on my rating of the novel.*

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