The Forsaken Planet by Bryan Wilson - Book Review

I want to also thank Bryan Wilson for providing me a copy of this book to review!

Genesis

I first became introduced to The Power of the Stars series while randomly scrolling through X/Twitter. This seems to be a common trend for me as it feels like I am exposed to new amazing looking books every time I open the app.

This is only compounded as an influx of new indie authors market their books on the platform and I am all for it. Some of the best stories out there might have not been read yet simply because it’s coming from a debut indie author. I am looking to change that and 100% support the indie book community.

Going back to The Forsaken Planet, the thing that drew me was a post by Wilson giving “a little glimpse” into his world of his series. In the post, were some artwork pictures to portray the vibe of the story and I loved it!

One picture really intrigued me being an image of young guy holding a glowing green sword, starship cruisers descending in the background, and purple skies glowing ominously in the horizon.

So I did what a lot of people would do, I liked the post and commented.

From here, well, you can see below how it turned out.

Preamble

The Forsaken Planet is book number one in an ongoing series called The Power of the Stars. Wilson also recently announced the 2nd book title and cover with that entry being called The Son of the Prophets.

After completing the first book, I can tell you that the book 2 title makes complete sense as to what I would expect to see as a sequel to The Forsaken Planet. Also, the cover of book 2 looks stunning and has me very interested in finding out what exactly the building in the image represents in the story.

Other than knowing the book title, series name, and checking out the art I mentioned above, I had no clue what this book would be about.

I also read in a highlighted review of The Forsaken Planet that the book can also work as a YA novel which did not deter me at all from wanting to check it out. YA novels can also have great stories that still pack a punch with Brandon Sanderson’s Skyward series being a prime example for me. 

With all this being said, I dove head first into The Forsaken Planet with no expectations as I do for most novels.

Aftermath

The Forsaken Planet starts off exactly with what is described in the book’s description on the backside of the book.

“When mysterious aircraft wreak havoc across Earth’s skies, it is revealed that there are clusters of other planets where humankind resides, distant worlds where the people wield the power of the stars themselves. It is an energy force that can bring about miracles or, as the alien fleet’s ruthless leader displays, unleash horrors beyond imagination.”

We also are presented with a prologue from our antagonists perspective giving us a little teaser as to the impending doom they plan to enact on “The Forsaken Planet” being Earth.

The main POV in this story comes from our main character being Colton who is just your typical college student trying to make his way through the struggles of everyday life.

I wanted to also point this out now and note that it is not a spoiler as it’s also in the books description that we will heavily revolve around the “chosen one” trope that you most likely have seen in many other works in the sci-fi and fantasy genres.

There were 3 distinct segments that stood out to me within this book in terms of different phases our main character embarks on.

1. Enlightenment

2. Trials

3. Acceptance

Enlightenment

In this portion of the book, our main character and the rest of humanity abruptly comes to find out that we are not alone in the universe as a massive force of space crafts descends upon Earth.

We learn that there is an alien force (The Heart of the Flame) that is determined to wreak havoc on the Earth while another imposing force (The Throne) allies with us “earthlings” pushing away the destructive force tearing our world up.

I found this section to be the weakest area in the book as I struggled to connect with our main character, Colton. I found there were a few scenes that needed more of an emotional response in order for me to better emphasize with the character and make it feel more realistic. I also found this section to feel a little rushed and not very atmospheric giving me a feeling that all the “chaos” happening is just matter-of-fact with little emotional pulls to the narrative.

We also are introduced to the chosen one prophecy in this section which I do think was pulled off successfully as we got a very great scene of impending demise that was flipped upside down alongside some exposition from the “good guys” of this situation and the prophecy.

From here, we quickly move to the next section of the book that takes up the majority of the story.

Trials

In this section of the book, we explore another trope that I am a huge fan of being an academy setting where Colton and thousands of others train to become soldiers in our newfound allies legions being The Throne.

We also get to explore the “magic” in this section heavily with our earthlings trying to harness the power of the stars being called Solara.

I do think Solara is a pretty cool magic system that offers a TON of benefits and capabilities with one major one being able to manifest a dome of power around individuals that can serve as a shield from incoming attackers.

Our main character and the rest of the earthling recruits traverse through this academy trying to harness and better understand the power of Solara while also weapon training with almost every weapon variant you can think of including…a very cool sword glowing with wisps of green Solara .

We are also introduced to three simulation trials for our earthlings to navigate through that test their ability to wield Solara, think strategically, and become acquainted to working as a team.

These trials were full of fun action scenes that put our main character in new and challenging environments that also included creepy creatures. We also got some great visual imagery scenes here that really did paint a full picture of my mind with my favorite being the simulation room itself.

This was described as being a whirlwind of Solara twisting around like a tornado that also painted the battle scene or wherever the recruits were having their simulation.

My only complaint in this Trials section was actually getting to the point of the simulations. It felt like the story pacing here fell off a little bit until the recruits made it to the boot camp portion of the story.

Acceptance

The last 20% or so of this book was fantastic! The stakes were raised tremendously with very immersive action scenes and brutal descriptions.

The reason I am calling this section “Acceptance” is that the prophecy told to us at the very beginning of this story is finally accepted and embraced by our main character, Colton.

I also really enjoyed the human focus Wilson placed within this section discussing what it means to be human and the choices we make are sometimes not for betterment of others only benefiting ourselves.

It's great to see that even a futuristic human civilization still has same problems that we earthlings have today. This is also concerning as uh…will we ever come to a point where all humans will live peacefully? Probably not, but that is what it means to be human and I really liked seeing this idea explored in The Forsaken Planet.

I would not say there were any real big twists or turns here towards the tail end of the story but it does an excellent job setting us up for many books to come.

Overall, The Forsaken Planet was a very enjoyable read setting up intricate world building, a main character you can root for, and an antagonist you can despise.

There is an entire mythos filled with gods and prophets that I didn't even get into yet that I am hoping is more explored in future installments of the series.

I rate The Forsaken Planet 4 out of 5 stars and recommend it to anyone looking for an action based science fantasy tale.

“Let it begin”

If you are interested in learning more about the Power of the Stars series, you can check out Bryan Wilson's site for updates & news HERE.

Also, I have a Patreon that is completely open for new members where I will place your name at the bottom of all future reviews and in all future videos. No pressure at all, I can’t thank you enough for simply reading this review and watching my videos. You ROCK!

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