The Painted Man Review

The Painted Man tells the tale of Arlen whom we meet as a 11 year old boy in the aftermath of a demon attack on the village of Tibbet's Brook. Arlen lives in a world where the coming of night brings the rise of the coreling , demons of various flavours ( wood near forests , stone in the highlands / mountain ranges and sand in the desert , you get the picture ) Humanity has chosen to hide behind magical wards that these coreling cannot cross , living sheltered lives only during daylight hours.

Without spoiling the story tragedy strikes and Arlen leaves home, determined to not be cowed by the coreling , angry at humanity's inability or lack of willingness to take back the night .

The story is also told through 2 other POV's , Leesha is a 13 year old girl at the start of the book and lives in the woodcutting town of Cutters Hollow . Her fairytale existence is shattered with public humiliation and she ends up apprenticed to the hamlets healer, a crone almost as fearsome as the demons themselves.


The third and final POV is that of young Rojan , when his parent wards are breached his family is slaughtered and he is taken in by the a wandering jongleur ( master performer be it in music / magic or song ) He is taken to the city of Fort Angiers and becomes apprentice to Dukes own minstrel.

Now so far it all seems so far so farmboy/girl saves the world , and I guess in part it is, but the books strength lies in the characterisation, we see Arlen , Leesha and Rojen grow up in little vignettes , skipping forward a few years each time. We get to see Leesha become a woman and an accomplished healer ( and carrier of knowledge protected by the women of her trade). We see Rojen's struggle to support himself and his alcoholic mentor, and we get to see Arlen grow to become a skilled ward maker who struggles to fight his inner demons (his desire to fight the coreling ) and eventually embarks on a career as a messenger , hunting for ways to fight the demons when he has the chance.

All in all the books has all the usual fantasy tropes , its largely predictable and it does absolutely nothing new...... However the strength lies in the way Brett has painted these characters and the absolute perfect pacing of the book . It rarely lets go from the first page , Arlen and co are very likeable , the character motivations are plausible and the corelings are suitably frightening . The Painted Man is very much a book in the mould of David Gemmell , anyone who loves a book that is simply a good fast paced story with likeable character need to read this .

Overall : 8.2 / 10