 We Are The Dead is the debut novel of Mike Shackle. It came out in 2019 and I have heard many good things about it. Many indeed. So why did it take me this long to read? Well, I wish I knew. I'm really bad with new releases sometimes. To make up for it, I have decided to talk about it a little bit today. So strap in and let's get this show on the road. Baby! The G.E.A.R. have had peace for a thousand years until their ancient enemy, the Eggrill, striked back with a vengeance, wielding the same magic that was once the G.E.A.'s ancestral rite. In less than a week, the G.E.A.R. people and their proud shulker warriors are decimated in under the yoke of their new conquerors. So opens Mike Shackle's We Are The Dead and I can promise you things will look up for the G.E.A.R. anytime soon. Let's look at the text first. It's adequate, the kind of prose that you become ignorant of the more you read it, that allows you to slip into the world and lose yourself. The writing doesn't do much beyond representing what is going on in a realist fashion, which is perfectly alright because it's gripping enough at the level of content. It's an engrossing world Shackle creates by writing brown characters, gripping action and setting a pace that sucks you right in. The dialogue was easy to follow and highly entertaining, although a few word choices sounded off to my ear. But what I would like to centre this review on is the characters themselves. And since the setting is somewhat Japanese inspired, I might even show off my mediocre anime knowledge and compare the main characters to, you guessed it, anime characters. Mostly because I'm looking for images to pillage for the editorial process. Our primary protagonist is Stinstra, the son of an honoured and well-known G.E.A. family of Shulker, one of the most promising trainees the Kotegei, the military academy of the Shulker has ever seen, if not for once more issue. She's a coward and an enormous one too. Her fear is of that petrifying kind, the one that freezes you and does not let you go. The arc she goes on, as you might imagine, is all about overcoming that fear and contributing to the fight against the egg bro. It's highly satisfying character development she goes through, and not a single chapter of her story read across as dull. I can't come up with just one anime character who'd fit Stinstra, so I thought of comparing her skill, but out of Mikasa from Attack on Titan, in her cowardice to that of, well, anyone who isn't Mikasa at the beginning of Attack on Titan. Other protagonists include Yas, whose new position as a servant girl to the local government building draws her into a world of intrigue and danger, which threatened the baby boy she has waiting for her at home as well as herself. Jax, a military man and one of the Shulker commanders now forced into the shadowy world of guerrilla warfare. Andren, who is a little shit that goes through a whole city sewer's wort of character development. He is obviously the shit emoji. But those are not all our viewpoints. There's one last one. That of we are the dead's primary antagonist, Dara's. Dara's is a paranoic. He's a fanatic and he has delusions of grandeur, which considering that he can return from the dead, creates a whole lot of complications for anyone with an axe to grind against him. He's also one of the finest characters in the book, pleasantly surprising and the epitome of what I think of as the chaotic evil within the alignment. All the twists I did not see coming had to do with him. I adored that. Good job to Mike Shackle for writing a compelling villain are absolutely still for my D&D campaigns. Supporting characters include a wizard called Arles Gord, a pestering mum and precious baby boy you have to protect. And a cousin you just want to kill sometimes. Among others. Oh yes, and the psychopath's Evie Twin sister, whose axe grinding skills are nothing to sneer at themselves. It has been nearly two years since this originally came out, so I think we'll indulge in some spoilers. Now, if you haven't read the book but would like to, look away and join us back at this time. My favourite villainous moment has to be Darius' nonchalant stabbing of his sister in her brain. I still remember her response without even looking it up. Oh, she said and died. Darius kills her because he sees her every word in her every act, an attempt to betray or undermine him. But remember how I said that Darius is a paranoic? I could not locate. At any point, textual evidence that Scarra, that is her name, was plotting against her brother. If anything, she seems to have been a loyal, right-hand woman. Always looking out for him. But that won't get you very far with as crazy a brother as Darius. What else? What else? I know. Sections of Thinstra's story had a classical fantasy feel to them, but inverted. There's our reluctant heroine with her supposedly magical sword. There's the young princess she's supposed to protect. And there's the wise mage looking out for both of them. Of course, the mage is badly wounded and dying. The princess is a helpless child and the warrior flinches at every broken twig and rustling of the snow. It's elements like these that exhibit Shackle's knowledge of his genre. And that awaken an endlessly nostalgic feeling in his readers. At least those of us who have read a lot of classical fantasy, like me, nerd that I am. Time for some teary-crafting now, I think, before this video comes to an end. And this might be spoilers, or it might be nonsensical fancy. About Midway through the book, Asgore mentions his brother, while he intends to talk about the waning of the Gears' magical swords and the danger of the egg-rills' newfound magic. The world goes like this. He died over a hundred, a hundred and twenty years ago. His name was Lafayenne. He was younger than me, but possessed a far greater talent. How did he die? I honestly don't know. When searching for more Chikara-wells, never returned. Chikara-wells are the magical wells which have magical energy, kind of mana-like, within them. Through the consumption of which mages in this world cast their magic. At least the Gears ones currently. There's a whole waning of the magic bit, which is really, really interesting and an excellent example of great world-building. Now, a hundred, a hundred and twenty years is about the time necessary, not only to modernise, but streamline a nation, turn it from a savage collection of tribes into an empire. If I had to bet on it, I'd guess that Lafayenne found the power he was looking for and wasn't willing to share with his big brother. And so he became the leader of the egg-rill, a man only mentioned never seen. A man who is stalled to be a prophet and the son of a god. A true god, the egg-rill are a lot about forcing the Jira and their polytheistic ways into a streamlined monotheism which has a bit of an evil Christianity vibe going on. I thoroughly enjoyed that element of it. Is We Are The Dead worth reading? You bet it is. It was one of the most enjoyable fantasies I have read in recent memory. It really helped me let go of some anxieties and I read it within, I think, four or five days with my very good friend, William Gwynne. Thank you to Will for doing this buddy read with me. And we had brilliant discussions on the different parts of this novel. You can find Will's channel, The Brothers Gwynne, on YouTube and you can follow him on Twitter at theWolfenPro1. You should probably see a link anytime now to The Brothers Gwynne channel. And of course, if you enjoyed this video, please like, share and subscribe to my own channel. I would appreciate that very dearly. And if you haven't, press the dislike button, tell me why. Just bring on the hate, I feed off of it. Like a parasite, something evil and dark and probably belonging in We Are The Dead. Until then, I'll see you next time. Bye!