The Copper Promise by Jen Williams
This is a fun book. It reminded me so much of some of my earlier forays into tabletop role-playing, with the mismatched group of heroes crawling through a dungeon and inadvertently unleashing the big bad at the beginning and then going through a number of minor adventures to piece together the macguffin they need to defeat the big bad at the end of the book. I swear I could almost hear the dice clattering across the table at times.
The main characters themselves are all interesting takes on fantasy stereotypes: Wydrin (the Copper Cat herself) plays the impish rogue, Sebastian plays the dishonoured knight striving to get back his mojo, and Frith is the wannabe mage chasing after forbidden arcane powers. Then there are the secondary characters: the dead man who makes life interesting for our protagonists, the unkillable demon worshipper who likes to cause pain and suffering, the slightly unhinged trickster god who eventually gives the heroes the tools they need to win out. They’re all well-written and lots of fun to follow around for five hundred or so pages.
As you can probably tell, I really enjoyed this book, and look forward to reading book two soon.
4.5 out of 5 stars. Definitely one I’d recommend to fans of RPGLit and wacky fantasy adventures.