I started reading The Sundering Forgotten Realms novels, in part, because my son has loved this world forever, but the only one he gave me to read had been darker than I prefer for my adventure fantasy. The Sundering, though, introduced me to some of the characters he loved and gave me a different view of the world.

Night of the Hunter has a huge cast with easily as many (if not more) villains than heroes, which isn’t even touching on the group of anti-heroes who have their heroic moments along with many not so heroic ones. Its strengths are in the complexity of the characters and the world, elegantly drawn with a skilled hand. The same can be said about the intertwining plots as the Spider Queen and Mielikki’s webs come into form through the actions of the full cast, in constant conflict with battles won and lost with each encounter.

This book is dark, uncomfortably so, to the point of giving me nightmares. At times, I found it slow with so many actors to follow about different tasks and the interjection of monologues from Drizzt Do’Urden, but ultimately it comes together. Much to my surprise, rather than getting lost in the abundance of point-of-view characters as I was in the beginning, I started to track the various groups so I could recognize who and where I was at the beginning of each new scene.

Drizzt’s first monologue ran long, but at the same time, it tells the reader just where this book falls in the overall timeline, and considering it had been almost two years since I read the previous book, I appreciated the effective catch-up. Once the catch-up finished and the action began, the story smoothed out for me, or perhaps that’s when I was sunk back into the world. And I enjoyed Drizzt’s philosophical sidebars as he tries to come to terms with what he’d been instrumental in bringing about.

The same may be true for the overwhelming number of characters at the beginning. To someone completely seeped in the world, it most likely acted as a quick reminder of familiar characters. I appreciated how the heroes rewrote the meaning of the previous events to change the path of the world in ways that felt plausible. They know more now than they did then, and the change is driven by that knowledge rather than having someone outside the story make the world take a quick right turn that has no grounding in what came before.

Ultimately, Night of the Hunter, while it’s darker than I expect or prefer in adventure fantasy, has some moments of light. There are fun innovations, and analysis and conniving abound. The writing and characters are solid, and though the rare moments of omniscience point of view disconcerted me practically every time, most of the book is a mix of close and distant third. This book is part of a continuing narrative that went on before and still has more to unfold, but it provides not one but many complete stories within its pages as the gods help to move their chosen into the right place and state of mind for the coming battle, an effort that allows for–no requires–character growth and change.

P.S. I received this book from the publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest review.