The first book in The Four Horsemen series ended with Pestilence, now going by Victor, telling Sara that he felt his brother War waking up, exactly five years after Pestilence made his appearance. Book two opens up three years after War has come to earth where he is currently conquering near Jerusalem.
We see a lot of differences when it comes to War and his brother Pestilence. War is more aware of human nature than his brother Pestilence was, as we first see him three years into his campaign whereas Pestilence was just starting out. War, besides having been on earth for a longer period of time when we are introduced to him, has the experience of living alongside humans whereas Pestilence was a lone rider. He seems to understand human ways more because of this compared to the way Pestilence seemed to struggle to understand certain things. Understanding humans does not give War any mercy or remorse, however. War truly enjoys his purpose, murder, slaughter, battle, raiding and pillaging, this all brings him joy, which differs from Pestilence, who stated several times that he did not enjoy doing what he did. This makes War feel all the more evil.
Almost immediately into the story the female lead, Miriam, comes face to face with War. Upon seeing her up close he claims that she is his wife so instead of killing her he takes her into his camp to live with him. War states later on that he spared Miriam’s life because she had a scar on her neck spelling the word ‘surrender’ in the angelic language. Pestilence didn’t kill Sara by either infecting her with his plague or with his bow and arrow because he saw the angelic word for ‘mercy’ spread on her tent in the light coming through the trees. I am predicting that the remaining two horsemen will see a sign in their language that in some way convinces them to spare the life of a woman, and this woman is the one that will convince them to spare humanity, as Sara and Miriam did. Speaking of which, I loved how the reason War decided to stop killing was because he asked Miriam if she thought he could be forgiven. When she said yes, he reasoned that if he, a terrible being whose sole purpose was to kill as much of humanity as possible, could be forgiven, then humans as a whole could as well.
Overall, I loved this book. I was barely able to restrain myself from starting Famine before writing this. I was tempted because I loved the end of this book, which if you don’t want to know, don’t read past this, just know that I recommend War.
We actually get a very brief glimpse of the birth of Famine! War, like Pestilence, feels his brother coming to life at the very end of the book. We are then taken to the man himself as he is being born. We get a description of his eyes, his armor, and his smirk, he is happy to finally be awake and begin his mission. This is the first time we have seen the actual birth of one of the horsemen, and it really intrigued me to see that he was born excited to fulfill his purpose. I wonder if he will be worse than his previous two brothers. War indicated that the remaining two horsemen were the worst of them and I can’t wait to see in what way this is true.
Nonfiction and Nonsense 