Jordan Conway has lived in an orphanage all his life, oblivious to a prophecy that will change his reality. When Sister Helen, the head nun, urges him to flee the orphanage and seek out the help of an archangel, Jordan gets caught in an ancient battle between the 7 archangels and Satan’s army of the fallen.
The premise of this book has everything a fantasy fiction reader would want:
- The chosen one trope
- An adventure that takes the protagonist across borders
- A battle between good vs. evil
- A layered fantasy plot
Or at least, it has everything that I love to read in fantasy novels!
I’ve never read about Christian mythology, and so I was eager to dive into the book to know more. The contextual chapters, from the point of view of Gabriel, that delved into the backstory of how Samael came to be Satan are well-written. They kept me engrossed throughout.
While I feel like the story, the approach had a lot of potential, the execution of the plot could’ve been improved. In several instances, I found the dialogues and narrative to be lacking conviction. The way Jordan almost tries to wield a sense of authority in the company of archangels, who are far better equipped with knowledge about their world, seemed forced. As if it was just there to iterate on the idea of him being the chosen one.
I didn’t particularly like Jordan’s character. My favourite chapters in the books were from the POV of Gabriel and Satan.
A few of the reviews I’ve read mention the travel aspect of the story as a criticism. However, I really enjoyed reading about Gabriel and Jordan’s journey across continents to gather the other archangels.
How they go about finding each one of them did seem a little too convenient (it shouldn’t be that easy to locate an archangel, right? Or Satan’s army would’ve done so earlier…). But because there are ample plot developments introduced throughout the travel, I liked it.
The ending is as much a cliffhanger as it is a foundation for the sequel. Considering that a lot of the world-building and history has already been covered in The Genesis of Seven, the next instalment in the series could be more action-packed in terms of making progress towards the main goal.
I will certainly be picking up the sequel because of how promising the storylines are. I just hope that some aspects of the storytelling and characterization are a bit more persuasive.
Note – I received an ALC of this book from Libro.fm in exchange for an honest review.
The Life Stories 