Book Title: The Avant Champion: Rising
Author: C.B. Samet
Book Series: The Avant Champion
Stars: 3/5

Spoilers Ahead!

So, in an effort to slow down my spending on books, I thought I would re-read something old. Browsing through my library, I pulled out a couple of books I had started but never finished, a couple of books I didn’t remember reading until I started them, and one book I didn’t remember buying. Avant Champion by C.B. Samet was the book I didn’t remember getting. 

Since I didn’t remember getting Avant Champion, I also had zero recollection of the synopsis that inspired me to pick it up. And ebooks, unlike paperbacks, do not have an easy way of flipping over the cover to read the book’s hook. I was going in blind. Which meant that the opening chapter really set up my expectations. 

“I didn’t want to die, but I could see no other option. My purpose was to die – in this day, at this moment, by the hand of Evil.” ~chapter 1, The Avant Champion: Rising. 

The next line indicates a time skip backwards 18 days. Well, there is the set up. Main character is going to die by the end of the book and the eighteen days leading up to the opening paragraph is going to show us why. Of course, as I am reading, I am also secretly hoping our intrepid heroine will survive Evil – but there is a general sense of sacrifice that is being set up. 

Abigail Cross begins her 18 day countdown working a ball as a servant for the Queen. Only that night she watches as shadow monsters kill her brother and finds herself responsible for protecting the Queen. On the run and baffled about what is happening to the kingdom, Abby flees first to the familiar grounds of the University where she had spent much of her recent years. But they can’t stay long, they are being hunted. 

Picking up extra help in the form of her brother’s friend, Joshua, Abby leads the Queen to a distant part of the Kingdom. A place Abby was familiar with from her years of field studies through the University program. There, they are given more aid and direction. First visit the Monks that outline the things Abby needs to collect to summon the Avant Champion who will defeat the Evil spreading across the land. Abby uses the friends she has met through her previous travels to collect the necessary items. 

Of course, we are not surprised to discover that Abby is the Avant Champion who has to face Evil. Now the opening makes sense. So, by this point I am expecting that Abby needs to die as a requirement for being the Champion. Or the Champion is really the person that sacrifices themself and through that sacrifice Evil is banished for another 1000 years. 

Turns out I was wrong. The Avant Champion is just a person who has to ‘kill’ the leader of Evil, which will drive the rest of the horde back to the volcanic island from whence they came. It is a literal battle of good versus evil. People die. So, when Abby lived, I figured another character would have to be sacrificed – sacrifice does come up a few times in the book. Joshua was the most likely candidate as Abby’s love interest (also her family is already dead). Nope, she saves him too. Then, just to make her tragic life less tragic, she will discover that her mother is actually still alive. 

Where to start in the analysis? Well, I liked the intro for setting up the climax. Only it didn’t play out at all as I expected. I think I like the way the story was written. We are following Abby along on her fetch and protect quest. As we go we learn a bit more about her life and her travels around the different corners of the kingdom. There were long sections of info-dumping, but it still read pretty well. 

The fetch quest format was fine. I like the idea of learning that myths are real. That there are many layers (think magic) to the world. The world itself was a puzzle. It was fantasy. Not medieval. Transportation technology was at the point of carriages and trains. Weapons were mostly spears, swords and arrows – no guns. Clothing for women included fancy gowns for the wealthy and trousers and tunics for many other women. 

The idea that Evil was literally the evil pulled out the People in the world and concentrated on the volcanic island where it would fester for about 1000 years then it would strike out and try to over take the kingdom was … interesting. I don’t know if I like the idea of providing a physical form to our evil hearts or find it simplistic in that there is not great weight to fighting it. 

That Abby’s entire life was manipulated to make her the Avant Champion was an interesting way to explore Fate and Free Will. The author could have pulled more on this theme throughout the book. But it was fine. 

The star tattoo that allows Abby to teleport around the world with ease is a bit overpowered. However as she is quickly established as having no great ambitions to take over the world. I can work with it. 

For me the biggest drawback was I started reading the novel thinking it was a complete story. I didn’t realize it was part of a series. And the big battle, that is foreshadowed in the opening two paragraphs, well that takes place three quarters into the book. That means the wrap up of everything accounts for 25% of the book’s length. That is a long section. And really, it is the justification for writing a sequel. I think I liked it better when the Champion beat Evil then went off and lived the rest of her life. But there are at least 4 more books about Abby.

Overall it is a fun story. It is neat to see how the different myths become real as Abby takes on the role of Avant Champion. It is difficult to overcome my hesitation about this being book one in a series. And the way magic just sort of reapers without other people commenting on it. I am giving this story 3 out of 5 stars – because I am picky.