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Book Review – Soul Swallowers, by D. Wallace Peach

Soul Swallowers by D. Wallace Peach

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Literary Fiction Meets High Fantasy

Soul Swallowers is the best fantasy novel I’ve read in a long time. It’s set in an area known as the Shattered Sea, and I call it literary fiction because it revolves around the lives of the inhabitants, noble and commoner alike. The people of the area practice a unique custom; when someone dies, their soul can be captured by a magical stone which can be swallowed by another person, so the swallowed soul lives on in the new host and is spared the tragedy of eternal wandering. I’m always leery of fantasy stories that rely on a gimmick, but the author integrates soul swallowing beautifully into the storyline; it doesn’t dominate the plot but augments it in a unique and interesting way. I call this story literary fiction because it deals with people’s lives, their joys and struggles, without relying on hackneyed fantasy tropes. Peach’s characters are well developed and multi-dimensional; the reader comes to know them intimately, perhaps illustrating the point that we are all of us one people, regardless of the environment in which we find ourselves. Slavery and bondage are also an important issues in Peach’s world, and the author relentlessly points out how such evil practices demean everyone, slave and owner alike. If I have one gripe, it’s that the story is unfinished, but Soul Swallowers is clearly labelled as Book 1, and I will certainly have no problem reading Book 2, or however many the author chooses to write in this fascinating setting.



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Book Review – The Bone Wall, by D. Wallace Peach

The Bone WallThe Bone Wall by D. Wallace Peach
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

D. Wallace Peach bills The Bone Wall as a post-apocalyptic fantasy – “a work of fantasy in a world without vision or concern for consequence”. It’s a coming of age story and deals with innocence lost in a particularly abrupt and violent fashion when their protective enclave, protected by shield known as the Bone Wall, falls. It’s told from the POV of twin sisters, one dark, one righteous, bound to each other by powerful magic, who relate their adventures in the broken world and with its denizens. Predictably, the sisters seek to endow their world with a vision for the future and the ending does reflect some hope that things might change for the better.
Peach’s writing is often beautiful and even lyrical in places, but given the complexity of the world she’s created, sometimes the prose is not straightforward enough, leading to some confusion. She attempts to describe the philosophy, or lack thereof, that lead to the breaking of the world, sometimes to the story’s detriment. This leads to problems with the pacing, when I, the reader, want the story to move quickly but the author refuses to cooperate. But all in all, it’s a good read, and I will probably seek out some of the author’s other works in the future.


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