Malice

Young Corban watches enviously as other boys become warriors, learning sword and spear, and he longs for the day he can stand among those who guard his king's realm. That day comes sooner than he would wish. The Banished Lands remember an age when men and giants fought until the earth ran dark, and the broken fortresses of the giant clans still scar the land. Now the stones weep blood, giants stir again and there are sightings of great wyrms.

Drawing on mythology and the Iron Age, John Gwynne's award-winning first novel in The Faithful and the Fallen grows from one boy's coming of age into the shadow of a war in which angels and demons make the world their battlefield. It belongs with anyone who loves heroic fantasy with mud on its boots and old omens stirring beneath the surface.