Book Review : Upon A Burning Throne : Part 2 by Ashok Banker

By Murtaza Kuwarawala -
Title : Upon a Burning Throne : Part 2

Author : Ashok Banker

Genre : Mythological Retelling

Ashok Banker is one of those authors that I came across pretty recently when I had heard of Upon a Burning Throne which is a retelling of the epic saga Mahabharata. A bit of research across platforms, I was pretty much intrigued by his books and that was the time when I had picked up the first part of Upon a Burning Throne. Apparently for Indian audience, the book was divided into two parts for reasons unknown and since I had dedicated myself to the first part, I picked up this one to further prick my curiosity and here is my take on it.

Blurb (From Amazon):

He is poisoning the very heart of Hastinaga. And he must be stopped. The powerful demonlord Jarsun has declared war on the vast burnt empire. Wars, deceit and sorcery wreak havoc, practically shattering the realm. And he must be stopped. But how? the odds are unsurmountable. And then, on one dark night, everything changes. For the worse. Terror is unleashed, dark magic and death ravage hastinaga and the very meaning of love and longing changes in unimaginable ways. The three ambitious and courageous queens, Karni, Mayla and Geldry, devise tortuous ways of holding on to power as the men they are married to, the princes Adry and Shvate, struggle to keep the Burning Throne which they inherited from their illustrious forefathers. But how and at what cost?

As I had maintained my take on the part one, this book would have had a better impact if they had not been split up. The first part which did take up a lot of time to establish the central characters, this one jumps right into the action with Shvate's battle with Jarsun. For those who are familiar with the saga pretty much knows what to expect as the book goes by, but the author has beautifully minimised the original plot moving those in quick pace and adding new plots that are much more detailed.

Unlike the first part, since we are already familiar with the characters, it does not take the readers much time to get along with the story. I still remember turning the pages back and forth to find out the role of each character in the previous book which is not needed when you pick this one up. The story moves quite seamlessly to the next generation as well who will form the major circle in the next two books and prepare us for the epic battle that is soon to come.

So will I recommend this book? Out of many retellings of the saga, this one does make a good impact with new plots as we go by and has quite a unique way of taking the story forward. The author is sure to connect to those audience who loved the saga and I would surely recommend to anyone who is familiar to it. For those who are not, I would say that one should try to gain a basic knowledge of the saga and then pick this one up.

My Ratings - 🌟🌟🌟🌟 (4 out of 5 stars)

Book in Few Words - A much worthy retelling of the Epic Saga

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