Not that there wasn’t a part of him that wouldn’t have shaken that demon’s taloned hand like a brother, but that would have been a step too far. And so he watched the beast being enslaved to them ills again and knew that even as he fought every day for a better life for his people, he was a collaborator in a larger war. And he hated it.

The Vultures, criminal factions who use patriotism as an excuse for raiding businesses that support the Palleseen. Big Damn Heroes: Led by Shantrov, the insanity-inducing, hallucinatory forces of the Reproach are what save the refugees from the Gownhall from being arrested by the Palleseen forces set to guard the Anchorwood and Anchorage. I was super excited to read this book after reading that amazing synopsis, I mean this sounded like a book that would be right up my alley. Portals to different worlds, a tyrannical regime and occupying force, a dark and magical setting, all of the things that I really enjoy in a fantasy read to be honest. And to top it off, one of my favorite authors as the writer of the story? Yes, you could say I was pretty excited to sit down with this book. The Herons, river smugglers who bring weapons into the city from the surrounding country, and who get refugees out. Dirty Coward: For all his talk of Ilmari history and freedom, Ivarn Ostragar turns out to be one, and as soon as his life and position are threatened by an actual revolt he tries to flee the city.As you can see from that only partial list, we’re working with a lot of characters here. And rarely are more than two or three together at a time, which means a number of sub-plots peppering the over-arching dual narrative of the search for the stolen item and the possible rebellion against the Palleseen. Hoist by Her Own Petard: The Bitter Sisters are both killed by the giant centipede they used to feed their prisoners to. This is a demanding novel, one that rewarded me with some of the most beautiful scenes I've read, but in the end left me exhausted, though still pretty satisfied. The Reproach is a part of the city that used to house the rich and the wealthy, but has since succumbed to a curse of some kind. Now anyone that enters it unprepared, stays there for too long or gets caught by those that occupy it permanently, will be taken in by this curse and will be unable, or sometimes unwilling to leave. We can’t bring perfection to the world without the threat of force. We can’t rely on the threat of force unless they know we will follow up on it.”

The world Tchaikovsky presents is absolutely fascinating. Despite its tight focus geographically, because the characters come from different regions, cultures, and even worlds/dimensions, the novel offers up a rich stew of highly original elements: different types of magic, belief systems, governing systems, along with other basic magical tropes such as portals and curses, etc. We get tantalizing glimpses of all these without a lot of info dumps or an unnecessary amount of detail, and while I don’t mind exhaustive world-building, there’s something to be said for this method as well, which offers up a bit of mystery to nicely complement the fantastical. Hoyst; the Palleseen hangman. A secondary character, one we only see a couple of times, but one of the best in my opinion. He sells to those that are deemed criminals a personalised noose, and shaves them to their preference before they swing. I’m rating City of Last Chances 6/10 as it features moments of Tchaikovsky‘s brilliance but was hard work in places too. That being said, it was a unique reading experience that I would recommend mostly because I’d be interested to see what other people think of this intriguing book. I’d especially recommend City of Last Chances to readers who enjoyed the sweeping scale, industry, revolution and political turmoil of Joe Abercrombie’s Age of Madness. Pyrrhic Victory: The rebellion ultimately turns out to be one of these for the Pals. They succeed in putting down the students' revolt and the Siblingries' march, but they lose a lot of their men to the students, the Siblingries and the Reproach with little chance of getting replacements in the near future, the factories that produce materials for their war efforts are going to be out of commission for a long while, and the wider resistance movement of Telmark still exists. City of Last Chancesis a somewhat complex book. It tells the story of Ilmar, a city chafing under the occupation of an invading Palleseen force for the last three years. A city of many factions, for the occupation, against it, neutral and just... otherwise engaged. A city of various magics, both familiar and strange. A city of mysteries. A city of immigrants and occupiers and rich and poor and workers and feudal overlords and scholars and priests and gods and all manner of people in between... and all of whom are connected by threads of politics and obligation and camaraderie and rivalry and the shared experience of being in this city, at this time, under this regime.Unfortunately I also had some issues with this book. For starters, especially the first 40%, is really slow. And that slow pace, combined with the dense prose made it a struggle for me to get through it. Carelia and Evene; the duo known as the Bitter Sisters. They lead one of the largest criminal organisations in Ilmar; the Vultures. Every scene they were in was full of menace and tension. Never Mess with Granny: A twofer. The Bitter Sisters might be older women, but they are absolutely terrifying in their positions as heads of the Vultures. When the rebellion begins, they even put on armor and carry weapons. Then there is the structure. Every chapter for almost the first half of the book is narrated through the eyes of a different character. This makes the whole plot a bit convoluted, until everything becomes more clear in the second half.

Oppression. Political intrigue. Colonization. Religion. Poverty. Bigotry. Magic. Demons. Worker's rights. Crime. Revolution. Wrongful incarceration. These are all a part of this story by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Up till the very end, I had no idea how this was all going to wrap up, but when I had completed the last chapter, I felt very satisfied. The unpredictable nature of the City and the vast array of characters meant that there were so many directions the story could have taken, but Tchaikovsky balanced endings for all fittingly, bringing disparate elements into relevance and throwing some unexpected surprises in for good measure. I know many of my friends here on Goodreads have Adrian Tchaikosky as a must-read author, and that makes me so happy. Hellgram: the bouncer at the Anchorage, a magic-user, and a foreigner come via the Anchorwood accidentally To those that know Adrian's work a little better - yes, there are bugs and insects scattered intermittently throughout the story. I would be worried if there wasn't at this point.The story is set in the city of Ilmar which has been colonised by the Palleseen, a race who believe their way of life is the correct one. They have outlawed the old religions and placed new laws to bring every citizen under one rule, but behind the scenes a revolution is brewing. Then there is the Anchorwood, a place that holds portals to other worlds but also inhabits monsters to stop you getting out.

Here's some of my suggested characters to follow. Just start with whomever you're most intrigued by. City of Last Chances is a standalone novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky. The book explores the city and factions of the city of Ilmar, occupied three years ago by the Palleseen Sway, an all-conquering empire that seeks to “perfect” the world-and, with its control over Ilmar, potentially many worlds. For on Ilmar’s edge lies the Anchorwood, a grove of trees that, when the moon is full, becomes a gateway to distant, alien lands. Ilmar is, as well as being a melting pot of different nationalities, as well as suffering under the yoke of occupation, a city that has recently undergone something of an industrial revolution. Some of the immigrants have brought with them the technology of... demons. How to raise them, bind them in contracts, and have them do large scale drudge work at a pace and capacity humans can't match. And so the demons power factories, and people who worked on farms a generation before now risk limbs in the demon-run mills instead. The analogy to the industrial revolution isn't subtle here, but it doesn't have to be - it's setting the scene for a city undergoing abrupt and dramatic change. But with demons. Because why not? Indeed, while the world may be richly unique in its aspect, there’s also a joyous familiarity in the smartly exercised plot devices. There’s a Macguffin, a collection of unlikely heroes and a totalitarian state. All of which set the scene for a good solid dose of SFF.HELLGRAM (Jem's Reasons for Leaving, The Hospitality of the Varatsins, Ruslav in the Teeth, Breaking Things, Hellgram's War, Unity and Division, Resurrections). There are two superbly unique regions of the city that really help emphasise the story’s themes of colonisation and cultural decay, that being the Anchorwood and the Reproach. Ruslav; a street thug of moderate renown. His character undergoes multiple huge changes over the course of the story, and despite his straight forward set up, he became one of the most unique and nuanced characters of the book. The hemp,” [he] growled. “The roughest hog-bristle hemp you have. But I will have the shave. Let my corpse show the rope burn.” Ilmar has been known by many names, but most know it now as the City of Last Chances – and Adrian Tchaikovsky has woven it a tale of that and so much more.