Beneath A Thousand Skies

Summary:

Legends say a dead god is buried under the stone city of Ishcairn, protecting its inhabitants by dashing enemy fleets into the jagged coast of Craeburn. Adjunct professor Corrie Ecksley doesn’t believe any of that, but she knows from her work excavating nearby burial sites that the ancient Craeburn people believed it enough to name the city after their dead god, Ish.

When the ripples of a great war finally reach Craeburn’s shores, a terrifying new weapon is unleashed on the city that not even Ish can deter. A bomb that tears souls from bodies, driving anyone who witnessed the blast insane. But it is not the living that Corrie fears. Displaced spirits are hungry for a body, and care not if it already plays host to a soul.

No bullets can stop them, no walls are thick enough to keep them out.
No help is coming.
No one left but Corrie to stop the carnage, if she even can.

Pterodactyl screech * THIS BOOK*

THIS BLOODY (at some points literally) BOOK.

I LOVE IT.

Shattered Spirits has firmly placed itself as one of my favourite books for 2024. I don’t care that we’re less than a third of the year, this book has well and truly carved a niche for itself in my brain, and I don’t see it moving any time soon. I finished it days ago, and yet I am still utterly wrapped up in the imagery and atmosphere of this novella.

I’ll be honest, I went into this book with high expectations, because everyone I know who has read it has gone on to recommend it. Shattered Spirits laughed (in a deep echoing eldritch cackle) at my expectations and blew them out of the water (along with a few other things). First and foremost, I have to highlight just how beautifully this novella blends genres. We have fantastical elements through the ancient lore and mythology that shapes both world and story, along with Gaslamp elements (which were some of my favourite parts, and amongst the unfolding horror and spine-tingling chills, were the most grounding). Then we have the horror – which was a mixture of cosmic/eldritch horror; and almost gothic horror with the way the atmosphere built up layer by layer, and the emotional elements at play. Lastly, there are historical vibes. It doesn’t matter that Ishcairn, and the war are fictional, or that we have only this peek through the keyhole, Black layers the war and the conflict with personal loss and grief, to the wider impact, in a way that had me feeling as though this was something that had just stepped out of sight in history.

With such a blending of genres it would have been easy for Shattered Spirits to lose sight of itself, but Black has a tight hold on all the threads, and within the unavoidable limitations of a novella’s narrative length, manages not only to hit all the notes of those genres and make them sing, but does so in complex, richly imagined and utterly compelling story.

One of the reasons this book works so well is the worldbuilding. Black keeps the narrative centred on Ishcairn and its waters, but very much creates a world that continues beyond the borders of that setting. Through character work and lore, we are given glimpses of the wider tapestry, without ever losing sight of the immediate setting or taking away from the feeling that is happening here is EVERYTHING rather than a cog in a greater war, while making it clear that there is a broader game of chess at play. Ishcairn itself is a delightfully intricate setting’ and I loved the imagery of this city built on itself; and the idea of its history and lore being it’s literal and figurative foundation. (My inner archaeologist was having the best time with that element of this book); and while much of the narrative is based on the events, and our main character, I was very much there in that city – in the twisting undercity, the buried chapel – Black had made it wonderfully, vividly real for me.

The lore is on a whole other level. As with the city itself we are given layers of lore, from physical evidence and history that leads into the symbols that come to have such meaning, to the mythology behind the city itself which has funnelled both into religious devotion and misdirection; even to the existence of the city itself as well as its role and image in the wider world. I could happily have spent many hundreds of pages more diving into the lore, and yet, at the same time I was completely and utterly satisfied and enraptured by what Black showed us, and that is a fantastic balance to achieve. I also loved how the lore itself was its own source of dread, and there were definitely moments when we uncovered a new piece to the puzzle, where the dread rose, and I was sat there going ‘oh no’ – and that was before we got to see the resulting development in the supernatural phenomena sweeping the city.

That is another reason, why this novella is so utterly compelling and captivating. Each thread or clue Black gives us is integral to the narrative, with each element feeding into another. You could no more strip out any of the lore, than you could a piece of the setting, or a character moment. Yes, we are given that feeling that there is so much more to this world. But the instance we are in is utterly complete in and of itself.

Another reason of course, is the character work. Corrie our main character, has a wonderful character voice that pulls us into her story and experience; despite the length of the book, we got to explore her character and what had brought her to this point, both emotionally and in terms of experience. We got to see her strength, but also the cracks in the armour, the desires for more than she had and what she didn’t want. Nodding back to the gothic feel of this book, we are given the expectation that with a finance missing in action and presumed dead, this would be a character bowed by grief or haunted by lost love. Black beautifully subverts that, and instead gives us a fully realised character, who takes that hurt, and the tangled mess of relief, and uses it to forge her own path forward. Black’s character work is by no means limited to our protagonist, and the cast of side characters, no matter how fleeting – or even those present only through her reminiscences, were given vivid life and as with every other aspect of this book, it all felt very organic and layered. You could not have removed anyone of those characters and had the plot advance as it did… and even Hugh who I despised so much, was an integral part of the story (and I was very satisfied with how the scales balanced there).

Shattered Spirits nailed the atmospheric horror. Between the beautiful and horrifying descriptions, and the very realness and lived in feel of the world, Black also nailed the tension. The novella coiled around us, the pace building with each revelation, and each encounter with the unknown; and through a combination of unravelling events, and Corrie’s voice, we were given an looming sense of sand slipping through the hour glass; and that anticipation, and the immediacy of events and the fact that time was not on the character side, all led to the feeling that we were on a spiral that couldn’t be stopped until we hit the bottom.

And it was not the bottom I was expecting.

I will admit that it took me a second reading to fully grasp the ending – as much as any one can grasp hold of an eldritch ending with the ambiguity of what lies in that space. This I think was more because I was so focused on Corrie, having very much come to enjoy her voice and not expecting the twist in her path; and on a reread, the ending while still different than what I have might have expected, was both the perfect capstone for this story, but as with everything, was something that could stretch out and impact the world beyond Ishcairn. And left me sitting there chewing over the story, long after turning that last page.

Shattered Spirits was an utterly immersive read, and it is impossible to capture that completely here. Especially, as I would not want to spoil the journey that Corrie and the reader go through. However, this book, really nailed all its elements, and my only complaint is that I want more in this world. I’m already planning a reread for when my physical copy arrives (plus I’ll get to admire the cover some more). I would say this is a must read for anyone who loves dark fantasy, eldritch horror and a beautifully realised world, that I would happily plunge into… even if it wouldn’t end well for me.