“The City That Would Eat The World” is fantastic

I just sped through the new book by John Bierce and really loved it and wanted to recommend it to people here. I enjoyed Mage Errant too but this one felt like it stepped up to the next level. I downloaded it intending to read it later, but read the first sentence and had to keep going.

Thea was chiseling a particularly bitey mimic off the side of a bakery when the gods began to scream.

It’s a great adventure book set in an incredibly interesting world, with something interesting always happening from start to finish. It has a few flash backs in the first section and a couple reasonable spots to breathe, but overall is a fast paced adventure through an insane city. The world building is incredible and the ever expanding City and the reasons for it are great. There’s also tons of gods that grant people powers that are very unique and add a ton of character. It reminds me of Worm with a lighter tone, due to the variety of god gifts and clear thought on how they would “realistically” impact this fantasy world and its development. It has two main POV characters that it swaps between with one feeling a bit more “main” than the other. Both are great though and have interesting and different personalities that play off well from each other. The overall plot also kept me hooked the whole time. It also has plenty to say about politics, power, economics, class, and plenty more which is all interesting. The author has clearly done a ton of research to make this world and figure out how everything would interact, which is also a trait of his other books, and I think it really paid off here.

As potential downsides the real world messaging can be a bit heavy handed which the author does acknowledge in the afterword. Also the dialogue can be a bit simple and YA/quippy at times. Neither of these personally bothered me and I think worked well with the tone of the book, but I could see them being reasons others do bounce off.

Overall it’s an amazing book and start to the series. For me personally it’s Cradle and Dungeon Crawler Carl tier where I will be reading the next book instantly on release. I would absolutely recommend it for any progression fantasy fans, and anyone who wants a fun adventure in an incredibly unique world.