The Ale Boy's Feast - Jeffrey Overstreet

The Ale Boy's Feast (Overstreet, 2011)

The kingdoms of the Expanse are crumbling fast.  As new and more violent threats come out of the Cent Regus core, animals disappear from the wild, and people flee to ancient strongholds in hopes of starting anew. Meanwhile, the courageous ale boy of House Abascar is leading the human prisoners of the beastmen on an underground escape, in the course of which he will discover the source of this disintegrating world's troubles.

The Ale Boy's Feast brings the story of Auralia, Cal-Raven, and Cyndere to an ultimately satisfying end, though not all questions are completely answered, and it also hints at a new beginning.  The book deals with death, parting, and homecoming in very moving ways, as the characters balance an increasingly intense struggle for physical survival with nurturing a faith in things unseen.

The book has to cover so much narrative ground that it doesn't get to develop any particular story arc as fully as it could be. However, the juggling act is still fairly successful in covering enough bases to move the stories onward and keep the reader's interest. As the characters are continually disappointed in their hopes and plans in the world, their faith in the Keeper points them to something greater, something beyond their imagining, something truly and permanently "home".

Arbitrary rating: 4 out of 5 disintegrating worlds