The Fall of the Gods

Ryan Van Loan’s The Fall of the Gods is a swashbuckling, sail-punk fantasy series set in a vast world where pirates roam the seas, mages communicate across oceans, mechanical devices change the tide of battle, and magic is tightly controlled by the Dead Gods.

Buc and Eld are the first private detectives in the Servenzan Empire. Teenage Buc is a former streetrat, a smartass, sarcastic super-genius. Eld, her patient partner in crime-solving, is a calming influence…who is nonetheless capable of deadly violence. For the right price, these heroes for hire solve mysteries, fight crime, and battle monsters.

Packed with sea battles, chases, and narrow escapes, with dead gods, pirate queens, and shapeshifting mages, The Fall of the Gods is “a multilayered attack on tired adventure tropes” (Fran Wilde), a “Holmes and Watson fantasy” (K.B. Wagers) series with a heroine who “reminds [me] of Alexander Hamilton, if Hamilton were into stabbing and mayhem” (Fantasy Book Review).