Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman

I read this book earlier this year and it's my favorite novel I have read in Christ knows how long, have any of you guys read it too? There's a pretty good trope page about the book on this very site so like, I assume one of yous must have read it. What did you think?

OK,what's about?You'll need to give us a decent summary.

Basically it's the Black Death and things are not great in medieval france and this dude who was a knight but got his ass de-knighted because of political upheaval in the aftermath of like half of the french nobility dying at the Battle of Crecy is wandering the land with some other brigands doing the ol' "Plunder and pillage" thing that was the favorite activity of disgraced medieval soldiery. So they happen upon this house and they see this girl who is seeing angels and the bandits are like "dude lets be pedoiphiles and rape this little girl" but the main guy, Thomas is like "dude being a pedophile is like not good and we are not gonna do that" so he smokes the rest of the bandits and then the little girl is like "Hey I see angels and they are telling me to go to Paris and then to Avignon where the pope is at" and he's like "no" and she's like "yes" and he's like "no" and she's like "come on it's a holy quest" and he's like "ugh fine only till the next town" then they get to the next town and everyone's dead of plague except this gay alcoholic priest who is like "Yo Thomas can you do me a solid there's some sort of demonic eel in the river please smoke this thing" and he does but he almost dies so the priest and the little girl bring him back from the brink and then they set off to Paris

Along the way they run into various demonic ghouls and devils because it turns out that while these three are LAR Ping The Last of Us but in Medieval France up in Heaven there's big struggle going on because God hasn't shown up since Jesus so the Devil is like "well clearly God is gone so we can do what we want lets unleash the black plague and create an unending hell on earth by manipulating various medieval political figures" and so the book has this thing where like the main three are always in focus but at the back of your mind you never forget that things are getting awfully *Book of Revelation* up in heaven and thus their quest is paramount to fix the world.

Now, that plot seems rather simple eh? Well one I only told the first like 50 odd pages bc you know spoilers and such but also the plot *is* rather simple, but I bloody loved the characters and every second we spent with them, and I think that is the real selling point of the book besides the cool psychedelic imagery and heavy metal vibe. You grow to really enjoy hanging out with the three; Thomas is such a complicated person who basically entered Hell before he even died but in taking the responsibility of caring for this girl and alcoholic old priest he really evolves into a better person in an organic way that I found really relatable, especially as this year my main mission was to evolve into a better person instead of being a depressed asshole all day so they book resonated with me due to that

Great book, though of Buehlman's novels, I prefer The Suicide Motor Club (novice nun vs. vampires traveling the American highways).

I still need to read Suicide Motor Club but I did really enjoy it's sidequel (the one about vampires in 70's new york that the title eludes me bc im hungover and rather stressed at the moment)