Fantasy Book Critic: The Battle That Was Lost by Micheal S. Jackson (Reviewed by Matthew Higgins)

OFFICIAL BOOK BLURB: A bastard gets paid. That's the point of being a bastard, after all. Yet in war, payment in blood is more likely than payment in coin.

Staegrim knows coins better than he knows people, and he isn't giving his life away for free. Not to the rebels, not for the lords, and not for all of the bloody coins in Rengas.

But then... Everyone has a price.

OFFICIAL AUTHOR INFO: Mike writes, and when not writing he plays with his kids, works as a UX designer and plays drums. That’s the taster version. If you want to know more about me (and who doesn’t?) catch me on social media as @mikestepjack.

FORMAT/INFO: The Battle That Was Lost is a Ringlander novella. It was self-published by the author on October 13, 2022, and contains 87 pages. It also has a 30 page excerpt of the first Ringlander book.

OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: This was a fist pumpingly superlative entry into the world of Rengas; an utterly compelling novella with plenty of pulse pounding action, wry humour, and a surprising amount of worldbuilding.

Michael’s debut novel Ringlander has been on my TBR for a while now, mostly due to it’s absolutely gorgeous cover. It won high praise as a semi-finalist in the SPFBO 7 competition, and based upon the skill inside this novella, I can see why.

Staegrim shook his head at the heaps of dead horses barely a hundred paces south.

Just that first line instantly captivated me as a reader. Why are the horses dead, who is Staegrim, and where are we? For a little while, such questions continue, as the reader is thrust headfirst into a battle, taking place in a location called Dali. There is a lot of worldbuilding thrown into the prose here and throughout this novella, mostly through references to different locales and events going on in the world. For some readers, they may find this isn’t to their tastes because it is largely left unelaborated and up to the reader to piece it together through the map and any context we receive. For myself, I really enjoy the feeling of depth this gives to a world, and I am ok with feeling a little lost at first, only to discover more as the pages unfurl. Mike is really good at explaining the immediate situation, so readers will never be confused about what is going on in this narrative, it’s more the wider context of the world and the politics and events shaping it that are on the periphery here.

So, what ground does this novella cover? Well, it drops us into a battle between a group of rebel freedom fighters known as the Tsiorc, and the Bohr who are ‘inhuman’ man-bull creatures that have invaded and taken over the kingdom of Dali as well as other areas of Rengas. We follow from the perspective of the rebels with viewpoints from their captain Laeb (my personal favourite character), and Staegrim, a bastard hired to fight for the resistance.

Staegrim has a wry humour to him, almost a gallows sort of humour; a very blunt and funny character who just goes where the money takes him, although I still saw a heart filled centre to him. His apprentice-esque relationship with his female companion Qor was one that was actually very heartwarming. They constantly banter with eachother, forming a lot of the humour within this novella, however there is clearly a lot of fondness between them. As the novella progresses, we get flashbacks which tell the reader more about why these characters are here, and the context for the current battle. I would actually love it if we got another novella covering Staegrim and Qor’s escapades in the intervening years between first meeting and the current events.

Captain Laeb is my favourite character we are introduced to here. He is one of the passionate leaders of the freedom fighters, truly getting right into the thick of battle. By the end of the novella, I definitely wanted to be in there with him charging for the rebels with my sword raised high!! He is a kind-hearted, upright, passionate soul leading the charge against the colonising Bohrs, and his dedication to the cause, and strategic brilliance truly earned him a place in my heart.

That’s how good this novella was, that it introduced me to an entire new world, politics, and set of characters, and made me care, all within 57 short pages. Michael has clearly taken great and delicate care in constructing the world of Rengas, and the conflicts within it. There are references to gods, different factions, and other corners of the world. So much is left to explore within this giant sandbox, and I for one am incredibly excited to dive in.

CONCLUSION: You will not want to miss out on this fantastic work of short fiction and will almost certainly be reaching for the purchase button once you finish, if you have not dived into Michael’s debut ‘Ringlander: The path and the Way’. Characters you care for, humour, awesome visceral battle, this truly has it all for you fantasy fans out there.