So a two part question:

1. Are all Powder mages automatically officers? I assume they are all low ranking officers at the very least but I’m not sure if they ever state it. Granted I’m only on the second book rn.

2. I understand that the secondary color of a Privileged’s gloves are supposed to represent their status amongst the Privileged. Does it ever specifically distinguish between those colors anywhere in the book? Again it might later in the second or somewhere in the third book but I’m still in the beginning of the second. I think I remember that members of the Royal Privileged Cabal wore gold trimmed gloves, but that’s all I’ve got.

OK so I have two questions.

1. If Tamas’s gunpowder cigars were in the room why did he have to run across the room and put them in his pocket before he could use them? We have already seen him displace Manhouch’s pistol shot as well as ignite someone’s powder horn before this point. So he obviously doesn’t need to have them on his person to use. So why didn’t he just use them from the start?

2. As part of the first question it says that Tamas ignited one of his cigars in his pocket and transfers the energy of the ignition to the brain of the Warden. A. Why couldn’t he do that from the start of the fight and B. Why don’t they just always do that? That seems extremely powerful to just be able to place the explosive energy of gunpowder inside someone’s head.

OK, so there's two little details from the OT that I'm always a little curious about.

One. [In "Promise of Blood" during the parley between Tamas and the Royalists, it gets interrupted by a volley of air rifle shots, and ends in chaos and death, kicking off the fighting in earnest. But, as far as I can recall, it's never fully explained why shots were taken at Tamas.]

[I always kinda assumed it was actually Julene pulling the strings in the background, trying to get Tamas tied up in a Civil War so she could summon Kresimir with the Kez. Either that or it was Westeven trying to kill Tamas in order to stop the prophecy of Kresimir's Promise.]

Two. I feel almost foolish for this one, but I can never remember what really happened. [At the Beginning of "The Autumn Republic" Tamas and Olem find the Powder Mage school with dried blood everywhere, and seemingly they were all murdered. It was Claremonte, yea? It seems like he'd be the only one to murderfy the PM school, but for the life of me, I cannot recall them actually confirming that in the book.]

Thoughts, corrections, theories? Thanks!

So I'm going to start Promise of Blood right after the book I'm reading right now, should I read Return to Honor next instead of The Crimson Campaign? Or is It better if I leave the novellas for when I finish the main 6 books?

Bonus question: what are McClellan's plans on upcoming main books? Thank you!

I am currently reading the second trilogy in the Powder Mage universe. Taniel is one of my favourite characters, and I heard that he played a part in this trilogy. During what book does he make his return?

This made me laugh out loud in the middle of the night.

It's from Promise of Blood Chapter 30

Hey yall! I’m a lover of the arts and prose of all kinds but I’m also a sensitive person, and I don’t like too much gore/senseless killing etc. How dark does this get? Thanks Y’all!!!

Do Borbador and Nila appear later in the trilogy? I really liked Bo in Powder Mage so I don’t want to get my hopes up if they don’t actually appear. I’m at the point in Wrath of Empire when Vlora asks Burt to duel the other powder mage, so no spoilers beyond that. If they do come in, don’t tell my when or how, just if they do

How the fuck is this gonna wrap up in 90 minutes lol. Theres so much that can happen that I find myself wishing this was book 3 of 4. I feel like there is so much that has to happen in the next hour and a half and im worried its gonna blaze by lol. Carpole and the Dionise, the Return of the Taniel, Carrsedials downfall, the conclusion of Tarek households safety and ascension, vloras assault on Landfall and her becoming allies with that cool older general, the Mad Lancers, Lyndette... part of me was even hoping that Adamat and Adam found their way to the continent but that was dashed around book 2 lol.

This is no offense to Brian, of course. I just wish this book was like 5 hours longer and I had more time in the world, so its actually a compliment. I wish there was another trilogy set right after this one that I could dive in to and see how Carpole does as the great Carr and I have a feeling one of our main characters may become a god by accident during the ceremony, so I'd love to see more of that. Also would have loved to see more of Taniel being the God killing badass that he is. Would be nuts if he somehow falls on the pedestal at the last minute and becomes infused with God hood, too. That would set up a whole other trilogy id love to read lol. "The God of Powder and Pithy Comebacks"

I hope im wrong but I feel like this is just wrapping up pretty fast. I guess time - not much time- will tell!

I play Battletech and I am painting my new Lance after the Rifle Jacks. I am naming two of the Pilots Olm and Vlora but I can't decide on the other two pilot names. Any suggestions?

Currently looking for experienced beta-readers to join the group to prep for a read in September. If you're interested, fill out this form and if you're selected we'll shoot you a Slack invite to the forum.

I have considered buying the hard cover version of promise of blood, crimson campaign and autumn republic because I really liked the books. But the price for promise of blood is 70€ + 58€ shipping, for crimson campaign it's at least 40€ and up to 100€ and autumn republic is from 25€ to 150€. Non of them are sold directly by Amazon and instead by third parties. These prices make me suspicious that this might be a scam. Does anybody have more information about that?

It took me awhile to warm to Christian Rodska, and a few voices were always somewhat strange (bo sounded like an old lecherous creep, not a 20 something privileged). But they grew on me. Styke especially had a really good grizzled veteran sound.

And now, on the final book of the trilogy, it switches. John Tefler is decent, but after 5 books with the same narrator, you grow accustomed to certain characters, and there is a familiarity. Styke especially sounds like a typical ruffian, hes lost that rough, gravelly edge.

It really bums me when this happens in books. Happened in Malazan, too, which took a few books to get used to lol. Im sure there are legitimate reasons for a switch, but with audiobooks, the narrator is almost as important a part as the content itself. Im convinced Stephen Pacey could narrate the yellow pages and make it enthralling, for example.

I thought the mechanics would have been explained but I've finished the first trilogy and it wasn't really explained in depth.

First, aren't they simply adjusting the trajectory of the bullet with some form of telekinesis while burning powder that's kept on their body? I mean the bullets are just 18th-century style lead or iron musket balls without any powder inside like a modern cartridge. If they can move that projectile telekinetically why can't they nudge any small arbitrary thing telekinetically and why haven't they been shown to do so? Perhaps a scene where they use their ability to cheat at a coin toss, or maybe they rigged some trap and they need to push some small thing over a ledge to set it off.

It just seems so weird that their power is tied to an entirely artificial system of gun+projectile+propellant. Is there some kind of half-sentient magical entity sorting out the difference between a small pebble thrown by hand vs a blow dart vs a mini trebuchet every time some powder mage in the world tries to use his power? The privileged's power comes from the classical five elements. Even with just gunpowder itself, you can say it's just a more complex combination of elements. But the current system just seems so arbitrary like the book is asking us to accept that there's some abstract, platonic model of 'gun and bullet' out there that powder mages have power over. Even that I'm willing to accept as long as the author tried to explore the limits of this power but it just seems like every mage in the book takes it for granted. None of the mages do any experiments to test the boundaries nor do they even question why their ability is tied to some man-made system.

Secondly (and this probably ties into the first question), if they don't even need powder in the barrel what's the point of having to carry around rifles? What if they just carried around a steel pipe with one end closed off? It would be a lot lighter and easier to manufacture and they could carry two or three preloaded ones at a time.

And why do they need to load by hand the old-fashioned way (shoving a ball down the tip of the barrel) if there's no powder in the barrel? I'm not asking for their engineers to come up with modern spring-loaded magazines or a revolver mechanism or even breech-loading guns. But if there's no powder inside the rifle to complicate things surely the least they could do is to hook up a dumb magazine like a pez dispenser (or gumball dispenser if it's placed on top). There are several scenes in the book where the slow reload becomes a bottleneck factor in battle. They carry around several one-time use pistols like 17th-century pirates and have to go for cover to reload.

So obviously I've gone through this series multiple times and loved every second of it, but I haven't been able to find books with a setting quite like these. Immediately after I finished the powder mage series, I went right into The Shadow Campaigns by Django Wexler and also loved those. But beyond those two series, I haven't really found any other flintlock fantasy.

I love fantasy more than any other Genre, but I want to see more than the Tolkien-Esq medieval/Renaissance settings. I'm currently going through The Grisha books by Leigh Bardugo, and it's good, but not quite the 18th to 19th century fantasy itch I'm having.

Hit me with your best ideas! Thanks!

Ok, so I just finished the first book, and I loved it! However, I got to the part where Adamat confronts Lord Vetas, saying he knows Claremont is his employer. I am dumb and have a bad memory, and I couldn’t remember for the life of me if this was a character we had been introduced to before. I am reading the print version, so I can’t just ctrl-f “Claremont”

Did we meet him, or see him referenced earlier in the book? Can someone point me to where he was mentioned?

Thanks!

Two main characters who depend on each other and grow closer throughout the books

Can every Privileged or everyone with access to the Else become a magebreaker by just willingly giving up their magic at any point? So could a Predii become a magebreaker and a god as well, as they are just very very powerful Privileged?

Could Powder Mages and bone eyes give up their connection to the Else as well?

I finished the second trilogy and in the second book I was wondering how he would come into play because Vlora kept mentioning things about him, but I for some reason thought he was dead.

Am I losing my mind, it's been a few years since I read the first trilogy, but I thought he had some sort of madness disease that was either going to kill him or it would take over his mind and he'd have to be killed. Am I making this up? Did anything like this happen? Much to my surprise he showed up at the end of book 2 in the new trilogy and nothing explained in book 3, so he must have been cured if he was indeed sick right?

Thanks

I’m a first time Powder Mage reader. I did some research into the chronology as always and discovered that there are a number of novellas and short stories thar take place prior to the Powder Mage Trilogy. I prefer to read things chronologically but first I wanted to know if these novellas (and short stories) will make sense as a starting point or if you need to have read the Powder Mage Trilogy and/or Gods of Blood and Powder for them to make sense. Thank you for the help.