It's only a short book, so even those we meet briefly have enough proportionate time on the page that we remember them when they pop up again later. We spend enough time with each of the major players to get to know them. What we do get is a nice balance of variety and consistency: there's a range of POVs and characters, but not too many. I'm thinking of it as a novel because that's how the experience works best for me, I think, so I can consider it from the most favourable perspective. None of this is a criticism, by the way! Whether it's a novel or a collection has no bearing on its quality, but I think it's worth bringing up because how you read this book, what you expect from it going in, might affect how you enjoy it. (And of the longer ones, I'm not sure how many I would've enjoyed had I read them on their own, since they are so firmly situated in context.)

Some can, but some are short links that only work for me if I think of them as adding to the overall book rather than as being pieces in themselves. I think part of that is because there's a primary narrative thread through all of them, but more of it's because I don't think every story/chapter can stand on its own. The way I experienced this book wasn't as a short story collection but as a single novel with, well, chapters. It's got me to think about what I'd even define as a 'story', because I think if I had tried to read this the way I might usually read a collection of short stories, it wouldn't have worked for me. But most of all I enjoyed the world itself, and the magical creatures and things in it.I would recommend this book, but I would recommend reading it as a novel, I think! They’re also very well-written! I’m especially impressed by the dialogue. The stories themselves work well together, weaving this larger narrative without losing their own distinct voices so there’s a sense of variety.

The characters are interesting and unique, and never one-dimensional in their motives or desires. Hargreaves really manages to set down a classic fantasy world that feels new and interesting but is also not so complicated in its world building that it crowds the story.

At first I wasn’t quite sure I would, but halfway through the first story I was hooked. thief, a princess, a warrior, a Bladekin, and others roam through this fantasy world trying to stop evil and survive the process. The Shield Road is a collection of chronological fantasy short stories set in the same world, that follow different characters and accumulate into a larger narrative. A dream full of fire and screams, which echoed long after waking.

The Shield Road by Dewi Hargreaves