Shadows of God

Angels and demons alike watch and wait as the last warriors of old Europe invade the New World in this magnificent conclusion to the Age of Unreason alternate history series The alchemical catastrophe that Sir Isaac Newton inadvertently unleashed late in the seventeenth century has transformed Europe into a cold, dead wasteland in the eighteenth—much to the delight of the otherworldly malakim, who have set humanity at war with itself for the sin of dabbling in the arcane.   The last inhabitable territory, the New World, is now the coveted prize of the surviving European warlords. From the West, Russian forces led by the Sun Boy, child of the powerful French sorceress Adrienne de Mornay de Montchevreuil, move relentlessly onward, leaving a trail of devastation in their wake. British troops in the East are equally merciless in their conquests.   All that stands against them is a motley alliance of colonists, Native Americans, scientists, philosophers, displaced Europeans, and others led by Ben Franklin, now an alchemist of great repute, and Red Shoes, a Choctaw shaman with questionable motivations. But no matter who wins or loses, the manipulating angels and demons are always watching, and the malakim are determined to be the ultimate victors.   In The Shadows of God, the Age of Unreason, Greg Keyes’s magnificent alternate history series, comes to a stunning and most satisfying conclusion. It is the final chapter in a colorful, exciting, richly detailed, and ingeniously imagined chronicle of life on a damaged Earth where magic and science are on equal planes and history’s icons inhabit a past that never was.

“Inventive and exciting, filled with clever details and high adventure . . . likely to establish Keyes as one of the more significant and original new fantasy writers to appear in recent years.” —Science Fiction Chronicle   “Spicing his alternate historical fantasy with Swedenborgian metaphysics and Newtonian physics, Keyes peoples his story with a cast of unforgettable fictional and historical characters. . . . This vivid story of a world in the throes of revolution is highly recommended.” —Library Journal   “Keyes brings his multi-threaded yarn to a thrilling conclusion.” —Publishers Weekly

Greg Keyes was born in 1963 in Meridian, Mississippi. When his father took a job on the Navajo reservation in Arizona, Keyes was exposed at an early age to the cultures and stories of the Native Southwest, which would continue to influence him for years to come. He earned a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from Mississippi State University and a master’s degree from the University of Georgia. While pursuing a PhD at UGA, he wrote several novels, including The Waterborn and its sequel, The Blackgod. He followed these with the Age of Unreason books, the epic fantasy series Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone, and tie-in novels for numerous franchises, including Star Wars, Babylon 5, the Elder Scrolls, and Planet of the Apes. Keyes lives and works in Savannah, Georgia, with his wife, Nell; son, Archer; and daughter, Nellah.