Blackstaff Tower by Kevin E. Schend.
However, I'm not saying it's bad. I quite enjoyed it. But I can pick apart a lot of glaring mistakes in the flow of the overall story and the writing itself that I'm confident I could have done better. I'd have to have the book by me to list all of them (which I don't, and I doubt people would want to read that anyway), so here's only a few examples:
The prologue focuses on Vajra Safahr, the apprentice and heir to the Blackstaff Samark. For those who don't read Forgotten Realms, the Blackstaff is the second ultimate authority (the first is the Open Lord) in Waterdeep, the City of Splendors (and a major recurring setting throughout the books), and is an archmage with access to the memories and spellcasting talents of all previous Blackstaves, and besides has possession of Blackstaff Tower (calling it an impregnable fortress would be a severe understatement) and the Blackstaff itself, which is an incredibly powerful magical artifact.
So anyway, Vajra is waiting outside while Samark retrieves several items from a tomb outside Waterdeep. I think. That's my first problem. It's never clearly explained what exactly they're doing there. It's just an excuse for them to be out of Blackstaff Tower, and it stretches my suspension of disbelief when two very powerful mages are outside the city with only a few magical wards, no alarm spells around the area, and otherwise very few defenses, when they have a lot of enemies in Waterdeep, some of them mages almost as powerful as they are. I also question why Vajra (the weaker of the two) is the one who waits outside the tomb--alone. When no reason is really given for her to stay up there.
So of course, Vajra is attacked by a group of thugs. Naturally she takes out most of them, because they're not mages, but then Khondar "Ten Rings," a very powerful mage who wants to be the Blackstaff, attacks her. He beats her and is holding her hostage when Samark comes out. Here's my next problem. The Blackstaff and their heir are inextricably linked by magic, so it wouldn't be a stretch to say that one of them would know when the other cast a spell or was in danger (if not by the link itself, another spell relying on the link). Yet Samark comes out of the tomb with absolutely no knowledge that she was attacked. Now, he uses magic to take out the few remaining thugs and free Vajra, quickly forcing Khondar's surrender, because he's, you know, an archmage. Then there's my first problem with the writing itself--Samark is promptly killed by a "ring of energy" from another spellcaster. But that attack is described in the space of a line. I understand the emotional effect of abruptness, but it didn't work here. All the book says is that a ring of energy split him in two, which gives me very little of a mental image, as well as not really specifying what the ring even is. And also brings up the point of how this one attack is enough to kill him when Khondar (the Khondar that attacked Vajra was actually his son Centiv disguised by an illusion) is established later to be much weaker than Samark, which is why he needed the benefit of an ambush. Samark beat Centiv with barely any effort, so his magical defenses were barely exhausted, yet a single attack from a weaker mage kills him instantly?
Now, I will say I really like Centiv in his scene. The prologue establishes two things about him: One, That he's capable enough to beat Vajra, but also still only really an apprentice himself and no match for an archmage like Samark. Two, that he has a penchant for illusions. Throughout the book he impersonates several people (mostly Samark himself) and casts several other illusions, and the prologue neatly establishes this ability, making it not abrupt later when he impersonates Samark.
So anyway, Centiv and Khondar take Vajra captive so they can get information on how to get into Blackstaff tower so Khondar can try to steal the Blackstaff. However, chapter 1...jumps to some other people that don't seem to be relevant to Vajra's plight. A group of Waterdhavian nobles, Renaer, Faxhal, Vharem, and Torlyn. They talk about books in a tavern, then they leave and escape the Watch, which was looking for them because some low-level Watch commanders have a prejudice against them. I only like two things about this scene. First, it establishes Renaer's love of books and history, which is relevant later. Two, it establishes his evasion abilities, which also come into play later.
So then I expected the book to go back to Vajra and tie that scene to the group of nobles in some way, but it actually goes to yet another seemingly irrelevant character, a young sorceress named Laraelra. She hires a mercenary named Meloon and then goes down in the sewers to inspect something (she's part of the guild that handles that stuff) and ends up helping two dwarves also working down there, one of whom had been pinned by a falling stone while building a wall. So they send the two off to get medical attention while they finish the wall. However, they hear a screaming sound. So they go through the passage they were blocking off and follow it, where they find a drop-off (the sewers connect to other, older, tunnels under Waterdeep) that has sight of a small room where two men are torturing Vajra for information. I thought they'd go down there and save her, thus progressing the plot, but instead they leave and try to find information. Long story short, their search brings them to Renaer, and he gathers his noble friends (except Torlyn for...some reason) and they make their way to that spot by another route. Then Faxhal takes a crossbow bolt to the throat in an "emotional" scene. Except, it's so early in the book that the reader hasn't gotten to know him yet, so there's no actual emotional reaction; where instead told what we should feel by Renaer and company, who are very sad and angry. Faxhal is the most pointless character in the book; Renaer's hunt for revenge is only his driving motivation for the span of a chapter, and after that he's only even mentioned a few times. So they get through and eventually rescue Vajra.
Vajra herself is my biggest problem with the book. When Samark dies, all the knowledge and ability of every Blackstaff goes into her, which is normally supposed to only happen through a special ritual in Blackstaff Tower, with the Blackstaff in hand (which grounds the magical energy and makes it not traumatizing). That's fine, except the spirits of the previous Blackstaves possess Vajra for half the book, and she's unconscious for another fourth. She's supposed to be the main character, but we never see her actual personality except briefly in the prologue and in the last fourth of the book when she grounds the energy in Blackstaff Tower and comes into her full power. To be fair, that part is very good. But the re-unification of her mind loses some impact because we didn't really know her beforehand. Once she has her hand on the Blackstaff, the book improves a great deal, because then the actual battle begins; before that it was mostly the group running from Khondar to reach Blackstaff Tower.
...This turned out way longer than I wanted it to, but OH WELL. I have a habit of carefully scrutinizing things like that. Like I said, I still really enjoyed Blackstaff Tower; its plot lacks direction early on and the main character barely exists until the end, but the other characters are well written and the book is careful about establishing things (like Centiv's illusions or Renaer's love of history) beforehand, and for the most part does it well. The villains are also very good. It's just tarnished somewhat by the flaws I mentioned and a lot of similar ones.
No way in hell I'm bothering to proofread this right now, so if it turns out completely incoherent, whoops.
