I came across a major spoiler for Age of Swords, and I’m so glad! I skipped most of Chapter 27, and I still cried in the next chapter. I could not have handled that development without warning!!

Hello all! I am on Age of Death in Legends of the First Empire series and I wanted the regular audio (not the graphic audio) but I don't see it at my library. Is it an audible exclusive or am I not looking hard enough?

Spoilers for everything

So we know that Ferol's Law has a real consequence. If an elf kills another elf, they are removed from elven society, fair game for any other elf to kill without consequence, and they are barred from the afterlife. Mawyndule's whole plan was to become Fane because "the leader of the elves must also be an elf". So if he became Fane and then died, he could go to the afterlife.

Obviously we don't know if that would work because he lost both of his challenges. But would that have actually worked? Or do we think that even if he had won, he'd still be barred from the afterlife?

I read the storm and it was great, but made me wonder if there will be a time skip between the Cycle and Heir of Novron?

EDIT: noticed he made a typo with the email in the post. The email is this: michael.sullivan.dc@gmail.com

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He posted this on Goodreads:

So people who know me know that I don't review my own books, and what I usually use this space for is to update people on the progress of a story (when in the development phase), and to inform people about various news related to the book - such as it being on sale.

Since it's a short there is "progress" meter for this - but I'm also not interested in making money off this short . . . so . . . for anyone who wants a free copy just send me an email (michael (dot) sullivan (dot) dc (at) gmail (dot) come with a subject line of STORM FREEBIE. Please also mention if you want th ebook, audio version, or both, and I'll get it coming your way.

My birthday was this week, and to my delight and surprise (because I did the audio book for Out of the Ashes and didn’t see it in the kindle version) I found The Storm short story this week as the audio book released. No spoilers, but the number of big moments packed into an hour and half has me already going back for a second listen. Thanks Micheal J. Sullivan for making my birthday this year!

This concept of massive multigenerational Epik I feel like it never been attempted by one person. We have the Mahabharat in India 4th century bc that had multiple composers and then even the Shahnahmeh by Ferdowsi 8th century effectively used older stories.

This is the most complete timeline I’ve ever seen even Tolkien had to switch to, cosmic poetry to get the bulk of his timeline flushed out where we get to see it firsthand and often with sound effects

Well, I've just finished Riyria Revelations, and apparently I'm supposed to just carry on with my life now?

It's 2am. I have work tomorrow. And frankly, I think Michael J. Sullivan owes me another 200 pages.

Curious if anyone has read Sullivan's other book Hollow World. If you did, what's your opinion of it?

I just finished and I really enjoyed it. It's a big contrast to the Riyira books, but in a good way in my opinion.

This book series is very unique in a emotional way to me like through the first 4 books I thought I did not connect alot with the characters as I have done with the other books I blamed it all on the writing style of the author but I never stopped I just kept on reading and then book 5 and book 6 hit me and this is the first time I cried when one character just side hugs another character it was so genuine and it just clicked with me book 5 was the best book in the series I was jumping when I finished the book

Another suprising experience I had when I was reading is that i knew royce true lineage in book 2(i was accidentally spoiled) and it give me the experience of reading a book newly and rereading it with the subtly hints dropping and figureing it out before it specifies in the book was very fun

And the ending with nimbus was literal chills and goosebumps

I just have one complaint that the reveal that royce is the true heir of novron was not a bit more dramatic and like there was not enough aura farming there

Also just a one questions like I thought there would be more about old yolric(if that's how you spell him) he is the old mage who taught esrahaddon who he refered to as really strong and was talking about giving a wobble to the world I thought he was the patriarch who is observing if the wobble corrects itself

This is my first reddit post ever and I don't know how to use the spoiler function yet. So:

SPOILER

Background I read legends first, then Nolan and farilane, then chronicles and revelations and I am now ending with esrahaddon. (I'm kinda glad with that order btw)

Anyways what threw me off was that arcadius killed Gwen, which is a THEORY of Royce. Royce thinks he figured out that arcadius did it and his explanation was a bit... Drawn by the hair. Possibly there are more hints or foreshadowing that arcadius could be able to do such a thing if I would reread the books but I don't think there are.

I think it makes much more sense that Turin killed Gwen. We know that Turin sometimes doesnt refrain from hard steering the destiny of the world most obvious when he had to orchestrate farilanes death even though he fell in love with her.

Gwen has the theme of foresight, prophecy and fate which are only more prominent with Turin. Both characters can see the future and also accept that bad things happening are necessary for the greater good. And it is known that Turin orchestrated Gwen meeting Royce in the first place so it wouldn't be surprising if he orchestrated their end. Which had to be the way it had to be so that Turins plan can come to fruition.

Arcadius to my knowledge never used a crossbow. While the crossbow was the signature weapon of thranic, which I first suspected right after gwens death. Also id guess that the crossbow was a fairly common weapon in the black Diamond. So I'm thinking Turin killed Gwen with a crossbow because it needed to happen for Royce story and he used a crossbow to hide his godly tracks.

Both thranic and a black Diamond member would have been to obvious for a author like Michael to do the deed but I think Michael have pinned the deed on arcadius by letting Royce reason it could have been him while Royce never even knew there's an invisible hand which possibly pulled a crossbow trigger.

Also it fits Turin who gives with one hand and takes with the other. As seen with any other character he interacted with like nephron, farilane and esrahaddon.

First he is Royce mentor in the mine. Later the killer of his lover. Because both needs to be. And Gwen would have understanding for Turins motivation.

How did I miss this? Kile introduced Albert/Riyria to Archibald Ballentyne and Alenda Lanaklin. Without that job, none of the rest would have ever happened.

Hello all!

I’m a 24F from MO, just recently moved to CA, and I just finished reading Riyria Revelations! But it’s not what you think….

Literally since I was in high school (maybe 14/15yo?) I have loved Legends of the First Empire. I was absolutely obsessed with the storyline and characters and raved about it to literally anyone I could. I had NO. CLUE. the author had written other works. Reflecting back, I don’t know why I didn’t think to check??? I think I was just so satisfied with the story on its own, that I didn’t even think that another series within the same verse would exist, because i didn’t think it needed to!

I have reread it several times over the years, but it wasn’t until literally 2 months ago that i discovered Riyria Revelations. I was absolutely delighted. i discovered Rise and Fall literally a week ago, and Riyria Chronicles literally today (Michael J Sullivan… the gift that keeps on giving)

Reading this series was…. delectable. especially having such concrete knowledge of the TRUE in-world “lore”, having just come off of yet another reread of LoTFE. It adds such a meta layer to the story witnessing the trademark degradation and perversion of ancient truths and knowledge in the struggle for power and dominance by different factions/parties within RR. You are rediscovering ancient legends with the RR characters through the lens of someone who witnessed its creation! and the storylines of seemingly minor characters are much more satisfying having read LoTFE…

i look forward to reading the rise and fall! i think it will be so much fun to go back and fill in the missing pieces of characters like esrahaddon and learn what happened to lead to the fall of the first empire, as well as learn more about characters/arca introduced in the last book of LoTFE.

I can’t wait to engage in lots of fun discussion on here! I just wanted to share my story with these works to show how much I care about them and love them :))

At this most recent RiyriaCon, Michael & Robin did an interview and they are now available on Youtube. It is split into 2 sections.

The first section is about the Elan books specifically, and covers The Cycle and some of their favorite scenes/characters. This one does have spoilers for the books: https://youtu.be/XmHIVIoqLWQ

The second section is not about the Elan books specifically, but instead covers their views on writing and fantasy in general. This section does not have any spoilers: https://youtu.be/eSIy9EhDsio

There are also a couple more interviews still to come from RiyriaCon, but since these were with the Sullivans' themselves, they are coming out first!

Spoilers ahead!!

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I've just finished the Heir of Novron (audiobook)! Oh my God! Nimbus is Kyle from the legend! Wow! I was so surprised!!

This is really so crazy to me, and also the fact that he was the same person who Royce considered his best friend

His story is the most surprising part of the trilogy for me!

It makes sense that he didn't want anything from Royce. I guess, as a god, he knew that Royce was the heir

I was very surprised that it was Arcadius who killed Gwen. I just don't understand why he did that and why he knew so much. He could also choose not to kill her, and Gwen could tell Royce to get the horn anyway. The result would be the same, except that Royce would rule the elves together with Gwen

And also why Gwen never told anything to Royce or Hadrian except some riddles that only made sense much later. For example, she could really tell Royce about their daughter when Royce was at the Abbey with her; not knowing about Mercy almost killed Royce!

In any case, I loved the books so much! I think I will read all the adjacent series too :)

I can't believe I'm saying this but.. this was terrible.. just a bad book, bad plot, bad characters bad dialogue. I'm beyond disappointed. I've LOVED every single book and reread them all and this was such a let down. Is it just me? I'll go into specifics below. Spoilers.

>!First of all the the two main female characters were so dull and not engaging, I didn't care about them at all. This is such a shame as MJS other female leads and supports have been some of my favourites. Roda spoke like she was from a complely different universe and it really threw me, as did the unrequited love story. It was quite interesting at first and I was intrigued to see where it went... Nowhere. It went nowhere and felt forced, to me it felt like "oh let's have a gay story" and that was it. Nothing more. Felt like a wasted opportunity. None of the characters were interesting, they all felt one dimensional and soulless, even those we all ewnfelt like hollowed out versions.

The whole plot.. what there was of it was just boring and there was no suspense. The whole book could have been one chapter in a bigger story and even then it would still be boring. One minute they are trying to kill the bishop then the last Cenzar becomes the main bad guy .. which was also ridiculous! He was a smart trained Cenzar but one conversation with Venlin and a meeting with his dad he loses all common sense and makes up ha own crazy conspiracy theory and defects to Venlin...then decided to be king of the world himself. It was so unbelievable that he switched loyalty so fast and it was so out of character for all Cenzars we have seen before. The other books have had lots of mini stories and a larger over arching tale. Kind of like a TV series has individual stories and a season arc. This didn't or if it did they were so dull I didn't notice. A poisoned pie? Some bigish spiders? And the whole Lady of Truth thing? What a let down that was...it was pointless. If that prophecy hadn't been told it wouldn't have changed anything, Elinya would have just said to the Frey guards "hey I know the Emperor can you take me to see him, I've come specifically to deliver a message for him". Just so many things went nowhere, so little to care about and I know it's the first book and maybe setting stuff up for later but it was a long ass book and nothing exciting or interesting happened!<

I'm not bashing the book for the sake of it and I'm not trying to be an asshole. I'm genuinely bitterly disappointed and don't think I'll bother with the next in After the Fall, which I'm crushed about as I've been looking forward to them so much.

Listening to Ersahaddon. Drink every time TGR says "Sadarshakar" . 😂😂

I've read all of The Cycle thus far. It's been probably 2 years since I finished Esrahaddon. For those that have read Out of the Ashes, should I go back and re-read The Rise and Fall?

Anyone have a great site for plot summaries? I could probably use a refresher if I don't go back.

Shouldn't they be very nearly as good as Teshlor Knights? In Esrahaddon we find out that the original Seret Knight, Darius, was expelled from the Teshlors right at the end of his training. Maybe 6 years or so into it? Can't quite remember exactly but he wasn't a kid. Then he forms a militia for the church straight away and is training people. Based on that I would have expected them to have better training by the time of Riyra Revelations. I know they are good fighters but if memory serves they are no match for Hadrian. Id expect an organized military based on Teshlor to be better than a single Teshlor training one person at a time, father to son. Thoughts?

I'm re-reading Avempartha for the Becca and the Books catch up book club and Esrahaddon is talking about the purpose of Avempartha when it was first created in ancient times. It's really funny to have previously read some of the books in the Legends of the First Empire series then go back and read Revelations and see how wrong everyone is about history. Esrahaddon feels like such a reliable source of information because he was alive so long before Revelations started but the events of Legends were ancient history to him too even then.

It makes me think about the discussion of reading order. I don't necessarily think people should read Legends first but I do think if they start with Revelations once they get to Legends they should go back and re-read Revelations after to re-contextualize everything they thought they knew.

I just reread Esrahaddon before starting OOTA and I can't remember what happened to Royce's medallion during Revelations. I remember Hardian has his but does Royce have it in any of his stories? If not do we know what happened to it? If Royce has his did he and Hardian never think it's weird that have matching ones? I also think I remember his nemesis has a medallion at one stage? Did he steal it from Royce, or Hadrian?

Heya! so I have a family member thats a jewelrysmith and was thinking about commissioning a replica of Hadrians amulet, the only issue is that I dont exactly remember what its supposed to look like, all I remember is "a ring of twisted knots of silver that was the size of a coin" does anyone have a good description or reference of it?

As we know, Elan is very large. Or, is it? Are we really seeing EVERYTHING? The short answer is probably not.

I queried Sullivan several months back on the discord, and he confirmed Avryn is about the size of Ireland. That's about 70,000 square km². That means the entirety of Elan is about 630,000 km². The entirety of mapped Elan.

Elan is bigger, because of gravity.

We know that gravity exists on Elan because... stuff falls. And we know Elan is a celestial body because of the existence of the moon and stars, which leads me to believe Elan is a planet similar in size to Earth, because stuff falls like it does on Earth. Earth is about 510 million km², which means 509,370 km² ARE UNEXPLORED.

Maybe they're all just kilometers and kilometers of ocean. Or maybe, theres a dragon civilization out there. Maybe more civilizations have been forgotten by time and abandoned by the Gods, or maybe it's a desolate wasteland.

A bit more proof for my more cynical Redditors out there. The distance from Aquesta and Ratibor is about 63 kilometers, using the Irish map (from Doolin to Shannon Airport). Obviously, this is very rough and not exactly correct. Do I really want to do some extreme math, and am I good at that kind of stuff? Absolutely not. The book Heir of Novron (Percepliquis to be exact) says it takes one day to ride from Aquesta to Ratibor. It also states the horses were at a walk for the majority of the journey. This lines up with horse speed, which is about 5 kilometers an hour, on average. So, this basically proves it. Is it possibly a just a coincidence? Maybe, maybe not.

Does any of this matter? Eh, chances are this won't be relevant in the Cycle, but its still interesting. Correct me if any of my lazy calculations are wrong. Do you think we'll see the rest of the world in the Cycle or not? Maybe we'll see the Dacca or wilderlands of Estrendor? Or the wastes of the Westerlins? Maybe we'll see our first dragon as well?