Review: Priest of Gallows

Hello everyone! I hope you all are good and safe and happy! I think I am coming back, this time for real. But oh guys, moving can be stressful! I am in dire need of a vacation. On a desert island. Just me and my books. And not a soul on sight. But I cannot see it in my future, sadly.
In the last post I wrote that at least I was reading, right? Wrong!!! I jinxed myself. This last week was so full of things to do that I have read something like 20 pages. During all week. How ghastly! But I am quite optimistic for next week, and I am keeping my finger crossed!
Anyway, enough complaints for today, let’s go to the point. And it is a big point today! I am here with my review of the new Peter McLean book. Yay!!!!

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to the Editor!

Title: Priest of Gallows
Series: War for the Rose Throne #3
Author: Peter McLean
Pages: 400
Publication Date: May 27th, 2021

Gangster, soldier, priest. Queen’s Man. Governor.
Tomas Piety has everything he ever wanted. In public he’s a wealthy, highly respected businessman, happily married to a beautiful woman and Governor of his home city of Ellinburg. In private, he’s no longer a gang lord but one of the Queen’s Men, invisible and officially non-existent, working in secret to protect his country.
But when the queen’s sudden death sees him summoned him back to the capital, he discovers his boss, Dieter Vogel, Provost Marshal of the Queen’s Men, is busy tightening his stranglehold on the country.
Just as he once fought for his Pious Men, he must now bend all his wit and hard-won wisdom to protect his queen – but now he can’t always tell if he’s on the right side.
Tomas has started to ask himself, what is the price of power? And more importantly, is it one he is willing to pay?

Nobody puts Tomas Piety in a corner.
I know. Quoting Dirty Dancing can seem a bit strange. Or a lot. Quite a lot. But this quote is just so perfect for this book! Sorry, not sorry.
The second book ended on a lot of dark notes, because Tomas was really in a bad place. He tries to do his best to protect his family, his streets and to do what it is right, but he has to deal with the cards that other gave him and it was a choice between bad choices. He was in a really bad corner and I was full of fears for this next book. But oh my! This was just so good!

In this book we see Tomas, out of his element and out of his city. He is in strange territory, between enemies, and yet we see him turn the table around. He is a man on a mission, and he has what it takes to get what he wants. Or sort of. It is amazing to see how, even if he is out of his depths, he manages to find his way around. And how he manages to always find a way. Sure, things are not perfect. Are not easy. And all is not what it seems. But he manages to remain true to himself, and to his people. And I am so looking forward for the next book, because even if I am quite scared, I need to see with my own eyes how Tomas would pull this out. Because at the beginning of the book he is a man on a mission, but at the end of it he is a man on a MISSION. And I just have to see how this would play out. And I need it now! Believe me, the plot is just so full of intrigues, and action, and things that you would be hooked up from the start, and you would take a breath only after reading the last word of it. It is so good!

And with a good plot we have some amazing characters. To be honest I would just repeat myself, because in my reviews for the first and second book I have said pretty much the same things, but it is good to just say them. Tomas is an amazing MC. He is one of those morally grey characters (and okay, he is more on the darker side of things), but his moral compass stand true. It is just not your usual moral compass. And even if at a first glance he can seem a pretty simple kind of man, he is not. And I really really enjoy him. His is also the voice that tells us the story, and it is a peculiar voice. You really feel him, and the author did an amazing job with it.
And then we have other complex characters. Bloody Anne is one of my favorite. She is a strong and fascinating woman, and she is Tomas’ best friend. It saddened me seeing them growing apart, the second book was pretty hard on this part, but in this third book things are getting a bit better. They are not as they were, but it is a bit better, and that made me so happy!
Rosie get more space in there, she become more real, and I appreciated her a lot. Then we have Billy, who is always the same strange little boy, even if he is not so little, he is growing to be his own man, and he can be pretty scary. I really hope that nothing bad would happen to him in the last book! And, last but not least, Ailsa. She is one of the more complex characters ever. It is not only that she is complex, it is that she is really inscrutable. She is so so hard to understand. And even if I am not her biggest fan, I have to admire her, because… well, I cannot understand how much of what we see is real, and how much is not. Again, the author did an amazing job with her.

Oh, I don’t know how it was possible, but I was forgetting Vogel. I know that I am repeating myself over and over, but the author did an amazing job with him. He is the best (or the worst) villain ever. He is so scary. And manipulative. He is an evil genius. And have I said yet that he is so scary??

There is so much to say about this book. And about its characters, because we get to seem all of them like people, complex and real. They all are damaged, in a way or another, and this series is one of the best about the post traumatic disorder. We get to see a lot of characters suffering from it (and it makes so much sense, since almost all of them were in a war on another) and mental health representation is really strong in there. But we get to see a lot of different sides of them. For example, we get to see Tomas making his way in a completely new environment, and not a friendly one at that, and he did great, but we get to see also a naive side of him, he is a man of action at heart and politics and intrigues are not his way. And sometimes he is slow to understand what it’s happening around him. And I mean really slow. Because even if all the facts are there to see, he is not as shrewd as the others who are playing the game.
And the intrigues are so intriguing, sorry for the pun! And it is also quite actual. And scary.
It is a wholesome book, and you can find so much in these pages!

To make a long story short, go and read this book. Now! And if you haven’t started this series yet… what are you waiting for??? Go, go go!!

Ah, one last little thing: this book is quite dark. Grim. And violent. So keep this in mind. But if this is not a problem for you… go and grab it. Now!

and half!

Have you read this book? Or the first one? And are you excited to start this series/book? (You should!) Let me know!

The book came out the 27th of May, and a lot of amazing blogs have written a review for you, if you want to know more check them out!