Wrath of the Fury Blade

February 12, 2018
Habiger and Kissee’s elven take on the police procedural may amuse those who enjoy the lighter side of both genres, but it’s bloated with exposition of the administrative details of its bland setting and naively shallow in its political components. In a world that will feel comfortably familiar to anyone who’s dabbled in fantasy gaming, pure-blood elves hold fascist sway over the land of Tenyl. Members of Pfeta fey Orung, the highest rank within the Elves of Purity, are murdered by a masked elf with the Fury Blade, a weapon that can cleave victims in half, but warps the mind of its wielder. Feisty Constable Insp. Reva Lunaria and her new partner, Seeker Ansee Carya, are put on the case, but the king’s secret police get in the way of a clean investigation. Halpbloeden, elves considered to be of impure lineage and stripped of their citizenship, react to their persecution with an unexplored glum resignation, and Ansee’s defense of them, clearly expected to telegraph goodness to the reader while being uncouth and risky in-world, is not tied in to a deeper sense of his character. Habiger and Kissee (Unremarkable) bill this as a series opener but fail to build ongoing reader investment in Reva and Ansee as a team.