Final volume in Friedman's hybrid Coldfire trilogy (When True Night Falls, 1993, etc.) set on planet Erna with its ambient magic ``fae'' and native ``rakh'' along with human colonists, sorcerers, demons, strong Church, and walking undead. This time, the science- fiction elements have faded almost into invisibilityleaving an ordinary and uninteresting supernatural clash between warrior- priest Damien Vryce, reluctantly allied with the undead sorcerer Garald Tarrant, and the powerful demon Calesta, with the usual falls from grace and last-gasp redemptions thrown in. A ponderous, preachy, and disappointing conclusion.
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-88677-664-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: DAW/Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
If this first volume is any indication, James’ trilogy could become one of the most talked-about and influential adventure...
Wrought with blood, iron, and jolting images, this swords-and-sorcery epic set in a mythical Africa is also part detective story, part quest fable, and part inquiry into the nature of truth, belief, and destiny.
Man Booker Prize winner James (A Brief History of Seven Killings, 2014 etc.) brings his obsession with legend, history, and folklore into this first volume of a projected Dark Star Trilogy. Its title characters are mercenaries, one of whom is called Leopard for his shape-shifting ability to assume the identify of a predatory jungle cat and the other called Tracker for having a sense of smell keen enough to find anything (and anybody) lost in this Byzantine, often hallucinatory Dark Ages version of the African continent. “It has been said you have a nose,” Tracker is told by many, including a sybaritic slave trader who asks him and his partner to find a strange young boy who has been missing for three years. “Just as I wish him to be found,” he tells them, “surely there are those who wish him to stay hidden.” And this is only one of many riddles Tracker comes across, with and without Leopard, as the search takes him to many unusual and dangerous locales, including crowded metropolises, dense forests, treacherous waterways, and, at times, even the mercurial skies overhead. Leopard is besieged throughout his odyssey by vampires, witches, thieves, hyenas, trickster monkeys, and other fantastic beings. He also acquires a motley entourage of helpers, including Sadogo, a gentle giant who doesn’t like being called a giant, Mossi, a witty prefect who’s something of a wizard at wielding two swords at once, and even a wise buffalo, who understands and responds to human commands. The longer the search for this missing child continues, the broader its parameters. And the nature of this search is as fluid and unpredictable as the characters’ moods, alliances, identities, and even sexual preferences. You can sometimes feel as lost in the dizzying machinations and tangled backstories of this exotic universe as Tracker and company. But James’ sensual, beautifully rendered prose and sweeping, precisely detailed narrative cast their own transfixing spell upon the reader. He not only brings a fresh multicultural perspective to a grand fantasy subgenre, but also broadens the genre’s psychological and metaphysical possibilities.
If this first volume is any indication, James’ trilogy could become one of the most talked-about and influential adventure epics since George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire was transformed into Game of Thrones.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-7352-2017-1
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An offbeat, engaging tale by a talented and original newcomer.
Debut fantasy features an intriguing, well-drawn mythology.
At first glance, the basic plot may seem standard: A young woman, narrator/protagonist Yeine Darr, is named heir to the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, which plunges her into a power struggle with two rival cousins. But Jemisin’s world-building and attention to detail raise this story to another level. In the novel’s complex but well-defined universe, a war between the gods took place in the distant past. The losing divinities were punished severely and forced to become the slaves of mortal humans. Yeine’s life becomes increasingly entangled with these subjugated gods as she navigates royal politics and tries to uncover the truth about her family history. Jemisin lavishes considerable care on her fictional universe, but she also creates a subtle, emotionally complex character in the thoughtful Yeine. Readers will definitely look forward to future installments of the projected Inheritance Trilogy.
An offbeat, engaging tale by a talented and original newcomer.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-0-316-04391-5
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Orbit/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2009
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