The debut novel from former GTA game designer / programmer Alan Campbell, Scar Night is an engaging fantasy read that combines Victorian detail with a dark, Gaiman-like tone. First in the Deepgate Trilogy, the book introduces us to the haphazard, industrial city of Deepgate. Suspended over a seemingly bottomless chasm, the city resides in a vast desert and is populated by a people who worship Ulcis: the god of chains.
Deepgate’s ruling authority is the Church of Ulcis, which uses military might and the restriction of mass education to govern all of society. Their priests preach the story of the goddess Ayen and how, at the beginning of time, she barred the doors of Heaven from mankind. One of the goddess’s sons, Ulcis, tried to overturn her rule and was consequently cast down to Earth. Now Ulcis resides at the bottom of the city’s abyss where he gathers the souls of humanity’s dead to create an army that will storm the gates of Heaven.
The book centers on one of Deepgate’s last angels, a scrawny boy by the name of Dill. Although the winged archons used to be vast in numbers, their kind has dwindled since the marauding barbarians of the desert have been quelled by blimp-like airships and a perfected arsenal of poisons. Confined to the Church Temple and constricted by numerous rules (such as one preventing him from learning how to fly), Dill is completely cut off from the world around him until he meets his next teacher, a young Spine assassin by the name of Rachel Hael.
Composed of an elite band of military executioners, the Spine were created to take down a half-crazed angel that has rampaged the city for the last three thousand years. Known only as Carnival, the heavily scarred, female seraph takes one life every month to sustain her immortality and sate an uncontrollable bloodlust.
When the head priest of the Church makes a horrific discovery in the depths of the Temple’s dungeons he decides to make a pact with Carnival and uses Dill as the bait to lure her into parley. Mr. Nettle, a seemingly indestructible scrounger from the Rope district, complicates matters when his daughter’s death spurs him on a no-holds-barred quest for vengeance. As the next scar night approaches and the Head Poisoner of Deepgate manages to recreate an ancient elixir of immortality, events literally spiral downward until the feverish pace of action reaches an apocalyptic crescendo.
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