The Yawning Gap by C.V. Vobh

SPFBO10

"Highly recommended for fans of Patrick Rothfuss and Robert Jordan." -BlueInk Review (starred review) A catastrophe a thousand years ago divided the world into isolated Fragments, eventually driving most of humanity back to a premodern lifestyle. Since then, an unexplained blight has been spreading, and strange and monstrous creatures have arisen in its midst. Cor, the son of a whisky distiller, doesn't know about any of this. His peaceful little village has been isolated for hundreds of years—until he finds a way out, wandering into another Fragment. It's rather less peaceful. But with the help of Brayleigh—a spritely redhead teen he soon befriends, who is a bit wiser to the ways of the world—maybe our sheltered whisky stillman can survive and, in time, make his way back home. Celeste has not been so sheltered. Her family was murdered by orks at age 8; she left the Academy at 18 to travel with a merchant caravan; and now, she's the orator for the new leader of the People's Commonwealth. Everything she's dreamt of is finally in reach ... so why does it feel farther away than ever? Deliad, the Knight-Lord of Norvester—the former kingdom replaced by the Commonwealth—would like nothing better than to confront those responsible with the edge of his halberd, Celeste included. But, with his small band of former knights stuck hiding in remote hills and half-starving, it's looking increasingly unlikely he'll ever get the chance. Nothing could be further from their minds than the workings of a Warlock a thousand miles away, and his obsessive decade-long pursuit of vengeance. Yet as fragmented as this world is, it's also a small one. Will the hand of vengeance reach them across a thousand miles? ... Or will they, perhaps, reach him first?