Last First Snow

Craft Sequence, Book 4

By: Max Gladstone

Narrated by: Troy Duran

Forty years after the God Wars, Dresediel Lex bears the scars of liberation - especially in the Skittersill, a poor district still bound by the fallen gods' decaying edicts. As long as the gods' wards last, they strangle development; when they fail, demons will be loosed upon the city. The King in Red hires Elayne Kevarian of the Craft firm Kelethres, Albrecht, and Ao to fix the wards, but the Skittersill's people have their own ideas. A protest rises against Elayne's work, led by Temoc, a warrior-priest turned community organizer who wants to build a peaceful future for his city, his wife, and his young son.

As Elayne drags Temoc and the King in Red to the bargaining table, old wounds reopen, old gods stir in their graves, civil blood breaks to new mutiny, and profiteers circle in the desert sky. Elayne and Temoc must fight conspiracy, dark magic, and their own demons to save the peace - or failing that, to save as many people as they can.

Set in a phenomenally built world in which lawyers ride lightning bolts, souls are currency, and cities are powered by the remains of fallen gods, Max Gladstone's Craft Sequence introduces listeners to a modern fantasy landscape and an epic struggle to build a just society.

©2015 Max Gladstone (P)2019 Tantor

Max Gladstone must be stopped

A good writer creates an antagonist you hate and fear. An excellent one does that, then shifts the focus without moving the camera, and suddenly that antagonist is a three-dimensional person whose perspective you understand and whose future you care about saving, and dammit, when did you start to love them? What the hell, Gladstone? He needs to knock it off.

More seriously, a content warning: this novel contains pretty intense descriptions of violence ^MINOR SPOILER^ in protest that is tipped into armed conflict and ultimately quashed by a war crime on a government’s own people. The story explores difficult themes like the aftermath of war, police brutality, colonialism, capitalist gentrification and oppression. It was hard to read. It hurt. Because of that, I didn’t love this book the way I’ve loved some of the others in the Craft Sequence—but for exactly the same reasons, it’s probably the best thing Gladstone has written in the series so far. The characters are complex, flawed, biased, afraid, tied together by love and guilt and obligation and written with incredible empathy. No “suddenly this occurred” narrative here: everything that happens in this novel, happens as a direct result of someone’s choices. The protagonist (an antagonist in a previous book set later in time) is one of the best written characters in the whole damn series. It’s so good. It’s so extremely good.

The only criticism I have concerns the narrator of the audio version of the novel. He did a stellar job, don’t get me wrong. I would be delighted to listen to other books he’s read. But how hard would it to have been to hire a Black or Native reader instead of asking a white guy to essentially read in the style of James Earl Jones? Here’s a book that is very much about colonialist systems of oppression, and they give the voice of the narrative to a white guy. It’s so sharply pat, so perfectly tone-deaf ironic that it’ll cut you.

Despite that move by the studio, the book is super worth your time whether you read with eyes or ears. A word to the wise: this novel is the earliest so far chronologically but 4th in the series; it should NOT be read first. Start with Three Parts Dead and go in publication order from there. But definitely start. Do it. Right now. <3

Deep and Rich

I have enjoyed the series but this, the 4th installment, was a particularly lush vignette for the "old religions" with a real feeling of reverence and authenticity for the character's religions.

Better than the previous book

I’m glad that I came back to the series. It holds a mirror up to our world in a way we need, which is a great use of SF/Fantasy.

Another Excellent Craft Sequence Novel!

I love the craft sequence for its highly imaginative setting and excellent characters, and Last First Snow continues the trend! Though the lens of the fantasy setting, these novels allow us to examine real world problems with a frankness that would otherwise be very uncomfortable. If you've made it this far, you know what I mean and will enjoy this novel at least as much as the ones that came before it!

Great voice

Very much in line with the rest of the series, if you liked the writing in the other's you will like this.

Yet another different reader, this one really suits the point of view.

If you can listen with a sub-woofer, very deep and rumbly. I like it.

Craft sequence

Read this book first in the Craft Sequence series, choosing to read in sequential order not as books were released. It was a slow start but picked up. Overall would recommend. Excited to see where the series goes from here.

prequels bore me

loved the first four books, but this one lacked narrative drive. never felt like I was getting to the bottom of anything very interesting. I wasn't very invested in the characters. I am biased insofar as I have never enjoyed prequels.