Somehow, someway, The Tower of Living and Dying is even better than The Court of Broken Knives. Anna Smith Spark has proven herself a master unparalleled, a writer of incomparable skill. Hers are the most twisted of delights and she seems to relish in drawing you into her darkest designs. As ever, it is her prose that ultimately sells her tale of conquest; she writes with a poet’s precision, conjuring something of sheer beauty out of the carnage she creates. You cannot help but be pulled into her orbit even as her narrative begs you to be repulsed by its gore filled madness. It may be early to say, but if book three sticks this landing then Empires of Dust will be a trilogy for the ages.