REVIEW: Sons of Darkness by Gourav Mohanty
Last Updated on January 22, 2025
Ahead of the release of Gourav Mohanty’s Dance of Shadows, I read the first book in the series, Sons of Darkness (shoutout to Micaela Alcaino for the mesmerizing cover artwork). Mohanty says the series is inspired by an Indian epic poem, the Mahabharata, and reimagines its characters in the bleak, nihilistic realm of Aryavrat.
The central plot surrounds a war between the city of Mathura, led by the shepherd-turned-usurper Krishna, and the emperor of Magadh, Jarasandh, who seeks revenge for the deaths of his daughters during the uprising. The book takes place during a one year armistice in the war, which kickstarts a continent’s worth of clever political scheming in the interim. Swirling beneath are prophecies, the return of immortal beings, and the rise of the foretold Son of Darkness.
There is a big cast and many POVs—you may need to bookmark the Dramatis Personae. Mohanty’s author’s note explicitly thanks George R.R. Martin for writing Game of Thrones, and Sons of Darkness reads very similarly. Royals scheme and manipulate, then we follow their webs to figure out who are the spiders and who are the flies.
I had mixed feelings about the characters; however, the consistently strong characterizations made everyone’s individuality pop from the beginning.
The first section of Sons of Darkness follows Krishna, smugly surviving in Mathura, and Shishupel, a former soldier Jarasandh roped back into politics. I was amused (and unfortunately identified) that even amidst war and diseased bodies catapulting into Mathura, Krishna’s ego was nursing petty bruises about what his brother and wife thought of his plans. Along with the cast in Mathura, his cunning kept me on my toes.
Shishupel fell flat for me. Despite a compelling initial characterization, he didn’t contribute much to the plot or develop as a character, which reduced him to a cameraman. It was fine if he was filming interesting plot points—he saw backroom deals and the epic final battle—but I often wished I could 2x the speed just for plot info.
Later, we follow several other characters, like Shakuni and Karna in the complex kingdom of Hastina. Though his sardonic comic relief didn’t land for me, Shakuni does subtly mastermind some wonderful manipulations (but undermines the payoff with unfortunate ‘little did he know’ ends to chapters). I enjoyed all of Karna’s chapters as a breath of fresh, idealistic, and wholehearted air which I welcomed in this ruthless world of subterfuge.
Chunks of Sons of Darkness are mostly dialogue about political manoeuvres. Luckily, Mohanty writes engaging dialogue and his writing style stopped my mind from wandering, but the plot can be slow and unbalanced. It certainly has its jaw-dropping moments, but sometimes the jaw pops right back up due to rushed follow-ups. Other times, like in one potentially heart breaking death, the jaw stays firmly attached because the emotional groundwork wasn’t there. It took a while for characters and schemes to converge for the Game of Thrones-esque betrayals, violence, and foiled plots that inspired the book.
When things converge, though, the storytelling is electric: I often had to pull up on the reins when I started to gallop through paragraphs. Mohanty has range in writing tension. Whether it was a dance, duel, massacre, revelation, cloud scraping pillar of fire, or brutal oracular ritual, Sons of Darkness can switch from politics to visceral prose for moments of truly delicious grimdark flavor. Images from a close quarters fight scene between two god-like archers will happily live rent-free in my mind for a long time, utilities included.
There are several female POV characters whom I felt had the most dynamic character arcs—we just don’t spend much time with them, sadly. I was intrigued by the arc of Princess Draupadi, a pawn in a repulsive political marriage. She was starting to see through class differences, instead finding power in identifying with other women in the story. Then… more other guys. I’m hopeful she’ll be back in the sequel.
My favorite was Satyabhama, leader of an all-female regiment of warriors and a nuanced, well-written character (very much gives a gruffer Lady Eboshi from Princess Mononoke). Headstrong, blunt, and proud, yet also vulnerable, playful and compassionate. If parts of the book were trimmed down, adding her as a POV character would have elevated the story for me.
Of the women, Nala had the most chapters, with tender moments of sacrifice, reflections on grief, and hints at learning the assassin’s ‘Dance of Shadows’. Her story mainly felt like a set up for what I assume will be a primary plotline in the sequel. She did get me excited for the Chakra and Mandala based magic system, which will be a major selling point for me in the next book. If you liked the alchemy circles in Full Metal Alchemist, you’ll be into this unique magic system, too.
For me, a great joy in Sons of Darkness is that Mohanty has taken the grimdark genre he loves and reoriented its eurocentric origins to center the Indian stories, characters, aesthetics and magic systems that lay at the heart of the plot and his world building. Some of these elements we didn’t see too much of in this book, like the return of humanity’s former enslavers, the Daevas, who are lurking in the background, or the magic system. Both are drawing me into the next book, where I think this story is really going to shine.
Despite my mixed feelings, I finished the book hugely impressed with Mohanty’s debut. He has talent, but more importantly I can tell he’s madly passionate about grimdark and storytelling. I’ll be following his career and certainly watching out for Dance of Shadows next month.
Read Sons of Darkness by Gourav Mohanty
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