OFFICIAL AUTHOR BIO: Richard was born in North Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. He spent most of his early life on Royal Air Force bases in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, and attended St Peter's School in York as a boarder. He studied law at the University of Manchester, and spent most of the following ten years as a lawyer specialising in multi-million pound commercial disputes.

Between 2015 and 2018, Richard self-published THE ART OF WAR trilogy, a sequence of epic military space operas, as well as a number of prequels, novellas and short stories.

FORMAT/INFO: The Trials of Empire was published on February 6th, 2024 by Orbit Books. It is 544 pages and told from the first person POV of Helena. It is available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook formats.

OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: Sir Konrad and Helena may have dealt a brutal blow to the plans of their enemies, but that doesn't change the fact that the Empire of the Wolf is on the verge of collapse. With an army marshalling to march on the capital of Sova, Konrad knows that the imperial army won't be enough against a force empowered by demonic magiks. He and Helena must try to gather what allies they can before finally making a stand to defend the empire - or at least, what's left of it.

The Trials of Empire is a bleak but rewarding finale to a series that has been building towards a clash of monumental scale since book one. Readers of the series may recall that The Justice of Kings, book one in the trilogy, announced in its opening pages that by the end of the account, the Empire of the Wolf will have fallen. After spending The Tyranny of Faith watching the tragedy of Sir Konrad, Helena, and their allies trying in vain to stop dominos from toppling, we are at the crux of events that will define the fate of that empire.

It's not a happy book. It's gruesome, gory, and brutal, with one or two scenes I would like to scrub from my brain. And yet it's exactly the kind of book where the stakes are so well done, I was constantly driven to pick it up. This is especially true of the second half of the book, when the focus is on the struggle for control of the city of Sova. It's not just enemies outside the walls our heroes have to contend with, but also enemies within, as well as allies jockeying for whatever power they can gain in these desperate times.

It is certainly wearying to see the daunting task ahead of the characters, especially when they themselves are bone tired from the sheer exhaustion of trying to find the narrow path to victory Throughout it all, there's a constant interrogation of what methods are justifiable when it looks like good is about to be crushed by overwhelming evil. Are evil methods, while still evil, permissible if they stop a greater evil? If they spare thousands of others from death or torment? Do you risk becoming the thing you are trying to stop?

Helena herself has certainly grown since we first met in her The Justice of Kings, and I appreciated the ways in which she tried to hold Sir Konrad accountable in his actions, questioning him often. At the same time, I found myself throughout the book grappling with my feelings about Helena as a character, but maybe I'm meant to. She's a particularly ordinary young woman thrust into extraordinary events, caught up in the orbit of a man she has an unhealthy emotional relationship with. What little training she has is in law, not martial arts, and she can barely defend herself when the need arises. Powerful forces work around her and she is trying her best to simply stay alive. At times, I found myself wishing she was more capable in combat, a more traditional fantasy heroine instead of one that constantly needs rescuing.

But perhaps what makes Helena extraordinary is that even caught up in events that are largely out of her control, faced with near certain destruction, she keeps on keeping on. She doesn't have might or magic, but she is the one who stands in the room and points to the moral line, who pushes back against things that are easier but aren't right. When hope is lost, she will still try to save just a few more lives. I don't know that Helena will ever be my favorite character, but I have certainly grown to respect her over the course of the series.

The one critique I have of The Trials of Empire is minor and comes down more to preference. I've liked the more subdued fantasy nature of this series; while The Tyranny of Faith definitely increased our heroes' interactions with the realms of death and beyond, it still felt like a grounded story with gothic horror elements. But in this final battle, the magical stakes have cranked to eleven as incredibly powerful beings are interested in the outcome of the struggle, leading to one or two moments that felt a bit deus ex machina. I, however, was far more interested in the mortal struggles than the cosmic ones, though the two are intrinsically linked.

CONCLUSION: The Trials of Empire has cemented the Empire of the Wolf trilogy as a gripping read that fully pays off in the end. One small incident in a backwater town creates ripples that shake the foundations of an entire nation. I was absolutely engrossed in watching Konrad and Helena try to build a bulwark against the approaching tidal wave of destruction, both politically and militarily. I have to reiterate that there is much in this book that is not for the faint of heart, but if you are here for bloody and brutal strife, The Trials of Empire will reward you.