I saw some editing problems/typos early on, and my expectations sank, but I ended up admiring this first series entry. Writing is not life-changing but is never distractingly bad--and in the crowded field of historicals I think that's saying something. Decently atmospheric, a second half that picked up momentum instead of lost it. Cleaves to some tropes of the genre (hero with haunted familial and military past, femme fatale vs. woman of engaged sympathies and prodigious intellect, oil-and-water sidekick, adorable young errand runner in peril, etc.) but in a comforting way, I think. Whole series plans to span the decade in Moorish Spain leading up to the fall of Grenada in 1492 to Ferdinand and Isabella.

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