The Vengeful Scribe by E.M. Dash is an immersive, darkly emotional fantasy that blends second-chance with rich worldbuilding, social commentary, and vivid, character-driven drama.
Verdict: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (5/5 for dark fantasy readers)
The Vengeful Scribe Book Review
At its core, it’s the story of Jack, a man who died trying to take revenge on the sadistic noble who ruined his life. Given another chance in his sixteen-year-old body, Jack is determined to do things right this time: protect his family, choose his class carefully, and savor every ordinary moment he once took for granted. But his obsessive hatred for Baron Greaves simmers beneath the surface, threatening to ruin the fragile peace he’s reclaimed.
Please note: the rest of the review contains spoilers.
- Jack’s POV, filled with mature, haunting reflections on violence, trauma, and vengeance. Scenes like his near-breakdown while watching Greaves purchase a one-armed orc slave show his seething fury restrained only by hard-won lessons.
What sets this novel apart is its worldbuilding. Lundun isn’t just a backdrop, it’s a living city of clockwork automata, aether-powered street cleaners, enchanted dirigibles, and slum markets reeking of despair. Every detail feels grounded in a believable economy and social hierarchy, from the merchant classes’ subtle mind-affecting skills to the cruelty of rune-bound slave collars.
Equally strong is the family drama. Jack’s longing to hold his baby brother, the playful teasing by Polly; Jack’s sister, these moments feel real. Even the humour is biting and human.
Tonally, it’s darker than many Royal Road fantasies, but avoids cheap edgelord grimdark. Violence is graphic when needed (the death of the rat-faced rogue), but it’s never gratuitous. Trauma matters. Choices have consequences.
If there’s a flaw, it’s that the pace is deliberately slow, devoting whole chapters to shopping for a dagger, or being fitted for a suit. For readers looking for constant combat or dungeon delves, this will be too meandering. But for those who want deep immersion in setting and character psychology, that pacing is a feature, not a bug.
Jack’s internal conflict is beautifully handled. He knows killing Greaves would cost him his family, but his hatred is so strong he can’t stop himself from stalking the man through Lundun’s slave markets, dagger in hand. He sees himself as a monster barely holding the leash on worse impulses.
The Vengeful Scribe Baron Greaves
And then there’s that slave-market scene: Greaves casually buying a maimed, half-dead orc warrior for the orc’s power. It’s the kind of sequence that makes your skin crawl, perfectly showcasing both the fantasy setting’s moral rot and Jack’s deep, shaking fury.
Meanwhile, Zia’s scenes balance that darkness with raw humanity, she’s just a little orphan girl who finds a new family due to Jack’s kindness.
Final Verdict: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (5/5 for dark fantasy readers)
The Vengeful Scribe is intelligent, atmospheric, and unflinchingly human. It’s not just about revenge, it’s about what vengeance costs. For readers who want their fantasy rich with grime, magic, and moral weight, it’s essential reading.
The Vengeful Scribe Chapter 1 A Lesson in Dying Slowly Preview
The saying ‘The quill is mightier than the sword’ might inspire naive scribes, but a forty-one-year-old Apprentice Scribe with a damaged arm, a ruined eye, and half-scorched lungs should’ve known better.
How pathetic. I’M FUCKING PATHETIC! Jack’s mind screamed.
He gasped as searing pain radiated from his gut. He felt his own poisoned dagger being twisted and ripped free. His eyes trembled from the pain as he clenched his teeth so tight they creaked.
Just a scratch would’ve been enough to kill the murdering basta…
His pitiful thoughts were cut short as the blade plunged back into his gut. Jack convulsed, breath hitching in shallow, rapid gasps. He gritted his teeth to stifle the cries of agony that threatened to escape. White globs of thick spittle spat from his tight lips as the unbearable pain forced muffled grunts from his throat.
I should’ve died in the fire.
His killer, Viscount Greaves, was savouring every moment of his torment. After the Viscount disarmed him with almost supernatural precision, the old noble had severed the tendons and muscles in both arms. The counterattack had been so swift and surgical, Jack hadn’t even had time to register the movement before he was bleeding, crippled, and helpless.
Now, Jack’s arms hung useless at his sides, incapable of forming a fist.
Greaves’ thick left hand remained locked around Jack’s neck while his right hand wielded the assassin’s dagger. Jack’s back was crushed against the rough alley wall. His feet dangled above the cobbles, twitching, useless, and powerless.
In his weakening state, all he could manage were feeble, futile kicks against the Viscount’s flabby stomach. There was no hope. The poison, his own damn poison, would kill him within a quarter-hour.
How is he so damn strong? he thought. He’s a bloody library administrator. Not a warrior. Not a… not this?
For twenty years, Jack had dreamed of killing the bastard who had murdered his family. But as a weak Apprentice Scribe with no fighting skills, he might as well have been a pathetic mouse challenging a mighty tiger. His failed assassination attempt had yielded nothing noteworthy. Not even a ruffle in the Viscount’s wispy blond hair.
He was a lamb biting at a lion. And now the lion had torn out his throat and was grinning at him with a bloody maw.
The noble was a sixty-year-old man draped in a fine woollen suit and top hat, its silk band stained with arrogance. But none of that mattered now. Jack’s fate was sealed. He was a dead man awaiting the next available appointment with Thanatos, the God of Death.
“Impressive weapon,” Viscount Greaves said as he examined the assassin’s dagger. The blade steamed, reeking of blood and shit. “How did a peasant get their filthy hands on a drow blade?”
Still holding Jack aloft with one hand, Greaves wiped the blade clean on the sleeve of Jack’s cheap leather armour, slicing a fresh gash into his forearm with ease. The dull glow from the aether lantern the Viscount had dropped during the attack made the weapon appear even deadlier. Its runes glowed in the light.
Jack winced at the fresh cut and vowed, I won’t… I won’t give him the satisfaction. Trying to block out the pain, his thoughts turned to the years wasted on scrounging for coin in backrooms and filthy taverns. His days spent inscribing spell scrolls under a haze of despair and depression. His evenings, a fog of cheap ale to drown out the cruel nightmares that burnt him most nights. All to save enough for the two things that might make justice possible.
The drow dagger and poison. Forged by drow hands, and enchanted with powerful runes to pierce armour and pass through most magical protections.
Ten years of coin and twenty years of hate, all poured into a single point of drow steel dripping in vengeance. Jack had placed all his hopes in the assassin’s blade and poison; he had believed it would give him an easy time killing a fat, lazy noble. A noble whose role was administering the Ancient Texts Department of the Royal Library.
Despite his cheap armour, he had convinced himself he’d over-prepared. He’d been mistaken, the drow blade had only drawn Jack’s blood… and, with it, his life.
Jack’s strength ebbed away as blood loss and poison took their toll. The world swam in and out of focus, his consciousness slipping away only to be dragged back by searing pain. All he longed for was to fade into oblivion and escape the humiliation and red-hot agony.
Noticing Jack’s lapses into unconsciousness, the Viscount drove the dagger into his shoulder and twisted it with deliberate malice. “Try to stay alert. You have questions to answer before you die,” he commanded, his tone as cold as his smile was sadistic. “Clearly, you don’t have the assassin class… I’d be dead now if you were a true assassin.” Amused by the failure of this middle-aged pretender, he scoffed, “So, who sent you to your pointless death?” His frown conveyed genuine insult at being confronted by such a poor imitation of an assassin.
Despite the question, the Viscount did not loosen the grip on Jack’s neck.
Amid the haze of pain, Jack’s thoughts stumbled for any hope of killing Greaves. In desperation, he rifled through his scribe skills for anything that could help him.
[Class Screen-Internal View]…
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