11 books3 my picksEvery card says who recommends it
Finished Brian McClellan’s trilogy and want more muskets, generals and magic that changes the battle? Every book below was recommended to Powder Mage readers by McClellan himself, a book creator, readers on Reddit, or is read by the same readers on Goodreads. Each card says which, and what is different. The list is spoiler-free.
Want to stay in McClellan’s world first? Sins of Empire starts the Gods of Blood and Powder trilogy ten years after the original, with Lady Vlora Flint commanding a mercenary company in a city on the edge of revolt. Read the original trilogy first.
Joe AbercrombieStart with The First Law trilogy, book 1
Like Powder Mage
flawed officers, an inquisitor and compromised power, with plenty of dark humor.
The difference
grimdark, slower to reach the battlefield, and the magic is restrained. See our grimdark page.
Awards
Compton Crook Award finalist, 2008.
Recommended by
Readers on Reddit
What Brian McClellan reads
In a 2014 r/Fantasy AMA, McClellan, who studied under Brandon Sanderson in college, named Wesley Chu’s The Lives of Tao and Django Wexler’s The Thousand Names as the last books he had really enjoyed.
Cossack-style frontier war, gritty humor, defiance against empires, pike-and-shot warfare, and magic that costs the one who uses it.
Heads-up
Not a full campaign. It's an introduction to the world of the Witch Field, not a full book. It's a novelette about a community that must decide whether they welcome one empire to get rid of another.
Four years after her student, the chosen one, died when the witch field collapsed above him and destroyed a city, Witch-Major Irena Vahn is exiled to a fort on the eastern frontier. There she finds the same magical pattern that killed him, and a military system prepared to sacrifice the people it exists to protect.
Like Powder Mage
an army at war in a gunpowder world, where magic decides whether a line holds, and an investigation runs underneath.
The difference
pike and shot (ca. 1500–1650) rather than flintlock line infantry, and a veteran witch-major’s investigation instead of a coup.
Django Wexler’s The Thousand Names, which McClellan himself has recommended, for more gunpowder armies. Then In the Shadow of Lightning, McClellan’s own newer series.
Is Powder Mage flintlock fantasy?
Yes. Its powder mages draw power from gunpowder, and it is the series most often named as the place to start: the developers of the game Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn told Game Rant to begin the genre with it. See our flintlock fantasy guide for the wider shelf.
Are there books like Powder Mage with more investigation?
The Justice of Kings by Richard Swan and McClellan’s In the Shadow of Lightning.
Sources
Recommendations: the posts and video linked on each card; Brian McClellan’s 2014 r/Fantasy AMA; an r/powdermage “what should I read next” thread (credited as Readers on Reddit); Goodreads’ “Readers who enjoyed Promise of Blood also enjoyed” list.
Book descriptions and awards: the site’s book catalog and the Science Fiction Awards Database (sfadb.com).
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