You met him earlier this week, on Monday, when I told you who he was, and then again on Tuesday and Wednesday when he hosted #5MinuteFiction on his blog. Now I get to pick on him one more time with my review of The Black God’s War by Moses Siregar III, @MosesSiregar.

The Black God’s War is out! That’s right, it’s not only been released, but it’s at a special release-month price of $2.99.

Here’s what you can expect:

Against the backdrop of epic warfare and the powers of ten mysterious gods, Lucia struggles to understand The Black One.

Her father-king wants war.

Her messianic brother wants peace.

The black god wants his due.

She suffers all the consequences.

King Vieri is losing his war against the lands of Pawelon. Feeling abandoned by his god, he forces his son Caio, the kingdom’s holy savior, to lead his army. Victory ought to come soon.

To counter Caio’s powers, Pawelon’s prince enters the conflict. Rao is a gifted sage, a master of spiritual laws. He joins the rajah to defend their citadel against the invaders. But Rao’s ideals soon clash with his army’s general.

The Black One tortures Lucia nightly with visions promising another ten years of bloodshed. She can no longer tell the difference between the waking world and her nightmares. Lucia knows the black god too well. He entered her bed and dreams when she was ten.

The Black One watches, waiting to see Lucia confront an impossible decision over the fates of two men—and two lands.

Now that I’ve finally gotten to read the whole book in its entirety I can say, with confidence, that this is an example of the best sort of high fantasy. The worldbuilding and detail that went into it reminds me of Tad Williams, an author I adore. The detail of the opposing peoples and belief systems, as well as the role of the gods, was fascinating and well-realized. The many characters required for a story of this magnitude were varied and complex. As the story and the world goes, it’s what every high fantasy reader is looking for.

It’s also a great example of the detail and care every self-published writer needs to take with his product in order to be taken seriously. The cover is breathtaking, the formatting flawless, it was properly proofread. There are none of the punctuation and grammar distractions that self-published novels are often riddled with.

I love it in almost every way. That said, I had reservations about the actual prose. The style of writing is sometimes distracting, and detrimental to the characters and the conflict. Typically, this sort of thing is a real problem for me, but it’s a huge statement about the quality of the storyline, the pacing and development, that I hung in there to see how it all ended. Every beginning writer (me) has his weaknesses, and I think this is a good one to have. It’s a skill that can be learned in the way the imagination and creativity necessary to build this type of story cannot be.

In any case, The Black God’s War is definitely worth the read for the places it will take you. It’s a great ride.

Don’t miss the special release-month price of $2.99. And as an extra or for a friend, if you comment on this post, you’ll be entered to win a FREE Kindle copy of The Black God’s War. Just make sure you leave me some way to contact you if you win. A website link or twitter handle will work just fine. Good luck!