Published: March 31, 2026
Publisher: Orbit
Series: The Great Silence #2
Genre: Fantasy, Horror
Pages: 448 (Paperback)
My Rating: 4.5 Stars
A copy of this book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Synopsis:
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION BECKONS. SPIRITUAL CATASTROPHE LOOMS.
AND THE EMPIRE OF THE WOLF TEETERS ON THE BRINK
The true horror of the Great Silence has been revealed. As nation after nation succumbs to the mind-plague and Sova scrambles to enlist help from across the globe, Ambassador Renata Rainer has been given a simple task: save the world.
While she travels to the Principality of Casimir to enlist the help of the Empire’s oldest enemy, Lieutenant Peter Kleist returns to the haunted forests of the New East to search for ancient answers – and finally confront the terrible fate that awaits him. In their wake, a task force of engineers, soldiers, and arcane experts will try and unpick the final secrets of the Great Silence – on both sides of the mortal plane.
But time is running out. Count Lamprecht von Oldenburg has returned to the capital, armed with a terrible vision and enough madness to see it through. Those who stand in his way face a simple choice: join the revolution, or die.
As the world tips towards chaos, all paths converge on the Eye of the Sea, where the fabric of reality wears thin – and where the Empire of the Wolf must confront the most terrible enemy it has ever known.
Steel Gods is the second novel in the Great Silence trilogy from Sunday Times bestselling author Richard Swan – a dark flintlock fantasy filled with epic adventure, arcane mysteries and creeping dread
After settling into a new cast of characters and a drastically new Sova in Grave Empire, I felt like I could really appreciate what Richard Swan is doing in Steel Gods. This picks up right after the events of Grave Empire and we find most of our characters gathered in an attempt to locate the missing Blood Stone and divine what is happening in the afterlife. Lamprecht Von Oldenburg, perhaps a new favorite villain of mine, is continuing his mad rampage vacating anyone he deems annoying or within reach. While the threat of the Great Silence is itself powerfully terrifying, the fact that there is a human willingly advancing this makes it doubly so.
Though our ‘good guys’ start out together in Sova, they soon go their separate ways. Renata finds herself going to Iliyanabourg, the capital of Casimir, while Peter Kleist and his lover, Olwin, return to the Black Mountain confederacy where the cat men dwell. Captain Lyzander and Azura Ozolinsh remain in the capital of Sova where they continue their own investigations and then eventually come face to face with von Oldenburg’s own mad political machinations. There is an additional point of view added at the very beginning of this book – Captain Laine – who is a Sovan ship’s captain transporting a Tsukumese magician to the Eye of the Sea for an unknown reason. His chapters highlight a different angle of the events transpiring within Sova and Casimir and were surprisingly fascinating. I admit that naval settings don’t always work for me but there was such a focus on the characters and outside events that I didn’t find myself overly bogged down by hoisting sails and the scrubbing of decks.
Lamprecht von Oldenburg, the mad bastard, is possibly one of the best villains I’ve read about since Bartholomew Claver. He’s not even the ultimate ‘bad guy’, just an enthusiastic minion who happens to be fairly low in the food chain. He thinks he’s supporting the agenda of the Vorr, but they themselves are beholden to a more powerful entity from the afterlife. What’s amazing to me (and disturbingly parallels some of real life) is how enthusiastic people are to go along with his unhinged notions. He literally asks someone to make him a blood press. To put people in. And then they do it. No one bats an eye when he starts to scream or laugh hysterically for no apparent reason. I’d like to note that the mysterious burning man that he keeps seeing does have his identity revealed and all I could think was “You Again!!!”.
Steel Gods is a masterfully crafted tale of political machinations, supernatural horror, and action that I simply couldn’t put down. The variety of settings prevented things from ever feeling remotely stale and I found the pace to be relentless. The one bad thing about that is I felt that our characters never got a chance to decompress or feel real emotions other than ones of stress or fear. I would have loved for them to have the space to feel something positive – Renata and Lyzander or Peter and Olwin would have been perfect for this given their romantic inclinations. Even a simple moment of mundanity. Aside from this, there is nothing negative I can say about this book. I look forward to reading the final installment, particularly after the dramatic events that concluded Steel Gods.
Powder & Page 
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