I’ve made no secret of how much I enjoy the books of David Gemmell. He was, to my mind, one of the best to have ever put pen to paper in the genre. But in this post I want to put the spotlight on a story from the Drenai saga. This is my review of Winter Warriors.
The premise
A veteran unit of Drenai soldiers, led by the storied general known as the White Wolf, are disbanded by the emperor, Skanda. They served him loyally, but they are old men, and he has designs on expanding his empire. For that, he requires younger warriors.
Among the dismissed are Nogusta, a swordsman with an almost mystic quality about him, Kebra, a skilled archer with a dark past, and Bison, a hulking brute of a fighter who only wants to be a soldier.
But life after the army is quickly thrown into turmoil. A malevolent force works in the shadows, trying desperately to complete an ancient spell that will cast all the world into ruin. The three veteran warriors find themselves protecting a runaway queen and her unborn child. To succeed, they will need to fight untold dangers and overcome monumental odds.
The review
If you hadn’t gathered from my summary of the book’s premise, Winter Warriors is firmly in heroic fantasy territory. It is exactly the kind of territory that David Gemmell thrives in. He was, as I’ve written about before, a master of this.
The book’s three main characters—although there are more—are all older men. I always find this more interesting than coming-of-age fantasy stories, because the characters have already lived a life, and gained enough experience to make informed decisions. Or, at least, decisions that reflect their lived experiences. I always find it difficult to believe the “chosen one” orphan trope in fantasy stories because it never feels real enough to me. Winter Warriors does not have that problem.
That’s not to say all of the characters are old crumblies, though! The trio are joined by Dagorian, a young Drenai officer, Ulmenetha, a former priestess-turned-companion to the queen, the queen herself, a trio of children, and Antikas Karios, a skilled swordsman with an arrogant streak a mile long. This feels like quite a wide-ranging cast of characters to keep on top of, but Gemmell handles it brilliantly. Some readers would cry out for more depth to be added to some of this cast, but in my humble opinion Gemmell gives us just the right amount per each of them. It’s part of what makes his work so digestible, without the books feeling shallow or wooden.
Another hurdle this book needs to clear is the fact that it is—in a sense—a travelling story. By that I mean that the majority of the story follows our protagonists while they’re out on the road. This is an oft-lamented story mechanic, because many readers argue that travelling is the boring part of any story. However, Gemmell navigates it wonderfully, with plenty of character development, action sequences and a fast-developing plot all neatly interwoven throughout this journey. So much so that I used elements of Winter Warriors’ structure to inform my own fantasy debut, The Hunter’s Lament.
I’ve already mentioned the digestibility of Winter Warriors, and it’s such an accurate—if not a little inelegant—way of describing David Gemmell’s writing. The story moves at such a pace, but with just the right level of depth and detail, that you will finish it wondering just how he managed to get so much into a relatively short number of pages. And you’ll probably have these thoughts after just a few sessions reading this novel—maybe even a single sitting—because no matter how slowly you read, Winter Warriors is one of those novels that properly entices you to read “just one more chapter”.
That’s a rare power for a book to hold, and this one does it.
The verdict
It’ll come as no surprise (to any who know me) that I highly recommend you read Winter Warriors. Particularly if your interest is in heroic fantasy that feels a bit old skool, but without the overt misogyny and with a few more grey areas between the dark and the light. If you enjoy older characters then this should definitely be on your list, as our trio of Nogusta, Kebra and Bison provide more than their fair share of action, laughs and some moments of tenderness, too.
One day I’ll rank every David Gemmell book as I see them, but for now it should be enough to know that this book would sit comfortably in the upper percentile.
📚✌🏻SP
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Book One of the TURNED
The Sins of Steel and Shadow
Hated and reviled by humans and vampyrs alike, every day for a Turned is a deadly struggle. But when Bail is offered the chance of a lifetime, there’s much more at stake than just his survival.
The Turned series is a fast-paced, character-led, gritty fantasy saga for fans of Joe Abercrombie or Scott Lynch.
Steve Pannett is an author and designer based in Yorkshire, UK.
He writes primarily in the fantasy genre, combining character-led storytelling with epic, gritty world-building to create dark tales with plenty of action and lots of twists along the way.
He has self-published multiple books and is active online.
