It's hard to fight for survival on an empty stomach, but fortunately for the hero of Casthen Gain, the weird and wild physics of The Graven multiverse provide ample opportunities to create sustenance.
Casthen Gain is the latest novella from Essa Hansen, and marks a welcome return to the world of The Graven, her excellent space opera trilogy which consists of Nophek Gloss (2020), Azura Ghost (2021), and Ethera Grave (2023). The novella was published on July 28 by Grimdark Magazine, a long-running dark fantasy magazine which is now releasing novellas to tantalize readers even more. The team up between Hansen and Grimdark is a perfect opportunity to delve deeper into this imaginative, gritty but soulful space opera, and I'm happy to report that Casthen Gain delivers on that promise.
Read on for a SPOILER-FREE review of Casthen Gain.
The Set Up
Casthen Gain is a standalone novella which introduces a whole new cast of characters. Led by a culinarian named Sentace Ketch, the cast is engaging, unique, and fun to read about. Sentace is at the heart of the story, and every chapter is told from his point of view. He's an interesting figure with a very unusual skill set, to say the least. But he's far from the only intriguing character to pop up in this story; there are some compelling villains and endearing allies who crop up in this compact, 130-ish page book. For readers who enjoyed the found family elements of The Graven, you'll find plenty more of that to love here.
The story kicks off with Ketch and fourteen other prisoners being dumped on the home base world of the Casthen, the shadowy organization which served as one of the main antagonists in The Graven trilogy proper. The Casthen force these fifteen prisoners into a battle royale deep in the wild, with no supplies except those they had on them when they were captured. An anomaly the Casthen have been chasing is hidden somewhere in those lands, and if any one of the prisoners can find it, they'll be given the chance to join the Casthen and help further their agenda across the multiverse. But only one prisoner will be granted this boon — and the stay of execution that comes with it.
A Multiversal Chef
Sentace Ketch is not particularly interested in joining the Casthen. He has his own reasons for pursuing them, which inadvertently led to his capture. He's been employed by the people of his planet to track down and assassinate a woman named Evi Omai, who committed grave crimes against their secluded homeworld. Ketch thinks Omai has thrown in her lot with the Casthen, which is what brought him into their crosshairs and, subsequently, into the deadly battle royale.
You may not think that a culinarian is an ideal choice for an assassin, and that would be a reasonable assumption. But Sentace Ketch is no ordinary chef. He's also an expert in transuniversal effects, and has a keen eye for scavenging food from the wilderness. In other words, Sentace Ketch can make meals out of just about anything he can find, and use the warped physics of different bubble universes to manipulate those ingredients into delicious, filling dishes.
This is both fun for the cozy, Delicious In Dungeon-style meals made out of random space opera ingredients, and as a way for Hansen to play with one of the most imaginative and fascinating elements of The Graven world. This multiverse isn't the sort that has many alternate realities like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but instead has bubble universes of varying sizes, each with their own set of physics which can have a drastic impact on the flora and fauna within. Rather than using a traditional campfire, Sentace is an expert at analyzing the unique elements of bubble universes and capitalizing on them, using them for things like drying or cooling ingredients, encouraging fungi to grow at mach speed, or in some extreme circumstances, killing the other competitors by luring them into an inhospitable universe.
The bubble universes of The Graven are one of the saga's most unique worldbuilding elements, so the fact that Casthen Gain centers around a character who is singularly able to utilize them is a brilliant way to dig deeper into it.
Is it still cozy if your skin could get boiled off?
The juxtaposition of Sentace as both a diet-minded culinarian and a reluctant assassin is a fairly good metaphor for Casthen Gain as a whole. Typically when I think of foody speculative fiction, I expect it to lean toward cozy fantasy, like Legends & Lattes. But Casthen Gain isn't really that kind of story. Yes, it has some comforting elements as Sentace cooks for some of his new friends and builds the bonds of a found family, but danger is never too far off. And the danger is real. Sentace and his friends pretty much never emerge from a clash with another prisoner or deadly natural phenomena unscathed.
All this means that Casthen Gain has a solid balance between warm, cozy scenes, and those where you wonder if the characters will make it through with all their apendages in tact. Since it's published by Grimdark Magazine, it should come as no surprise that this book skews toward the dark and edgy. I don't know that I would call it cozy at all, since so much of the story revolves around a brutal challenge that pits people against each other to the death, so that they might be recruited by an even more brutal organization afterward. But for readers who love a good bit of edge-of-your-seat space opera but also want to feel connected to the characters and their plight, Casthen Gain really scratched that itch for me.
This book also hits some similar thematic notes to The Graven trilogy, which I really enjoyed. At the heart of Sentace's mission is a quest to escape the strangling conformity of his homeworld, and find ways to embrace free expression and exploration. Because Casthen Gain is a tight, focused novella, these ideas are able to shine through Sentace's quest to secure a future for himself.
Can you read Casthen Gain before The Graven?
One question you may have about Casthen Gain is whether you can read it without having read the entire Graven trilogy. The short answer is yes, you absolutely can. This novella takes place before The Graven, and is entirely self-contained. If you've never read Essa Hansen's work, this is a good way to dip your toes into this multiverse and see what it's all about.
But if you have read The Graven, this novella contains some very cool ties to the trilogy. Sentace's story fills in a couple of crucial blanks in the overall saga. But those ties never overshadow the immediate trial Sentace Ketch faces in the novella. The references to The Graven are good Easter eggs and essential lore, but the story is still fully enjoyable on its own, which makes for a great read that doesn't feel like it requires you to have kept meticulous notes from the trilogy.
For longtime readers of The Graven, this novella is a welcome return to the multiverse. If you even remotely enjoyed Hansen's previous works, you won't want to miss this one. And if you're just now discovering this saga, Casthen Gain is now a great new option for where to start, alongside the first novel of the trilogy, Nophek Gloss.
Verdict
Casthen Gain is a fantastic new addition to Essa Hansen's Graven multiverse. It's a tight, standalone story with a compelling cast of characters, that utilizes some of the most fascinating elements of this space opera world to their fullest. Combining comforting found family scenes with harrowing fights to the death, this novella is a thrilling way to spend a little more time in The Graven multiverse. I hope we get more like it from Hansen in the future.
Casthen Gain is available now, wherever books are sold. Head over to Grimdark Magazine or Essa Hansen's website to learn more.
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