While the first two books were amusing even for non-Dragon Age fans, this book is definitely less so. It is a bit slow-paced for the thirst 300 pages and not a lot happens. 

It has a few different themes it tackles, most of which will only attract Dragon Age fans that are interested in knowing more about the lore of the game. And even then there isn’t a lot of “new” lore to find here. Some old characters re-emerge, however, and it was great to see their stories continued.

First of all, the book discusses the Mage-Templar debate that every Dragon Age fan knows. It is something I find really impressively done in the games, because it’s such a difficult dilemma. Even the fandom is divided pretty evenly on how it should be solved and which party is in the right. In the book, however, it feels very black-and-white, with the templars as the absolute bad guys. It feels immoral to side with the templars in-game after reading this book, which is a shame.

Second of all, Cole is introduced. Cole is one of the companions in the third game, and a peculiar one at that. His story is interesting but I would’ve liked it to be worked out a little better.

Third, the whole phenomenon of tranquility is explored, which was so exciting to me. Sadly, this part of the story started at page 200 and ended at page 250.

And lastly, it draws more of a picture of what happened after a certain mage’s firework show in Kirkwall, and the rebellion of the mages. This starts at page 300, making the last 100 pages the most interesting of the whole book.
 
After reading this book it does bum me out that Rhys and Evangeline never came to see Cole in DA:I. Very sad and out of character.