Well-fashioned and often absorbing, if hampered by a dearth of sympathetic characters. A good start to the trilogy.
Start of a new fantasy trilogy—an elaborate vampire variant—from the author of the Coldfire trilogy (Crown of Shadows, 1995, etc.).
At the court of King Danton Aurelius, Magisters (immortal sorcerers) have gathered to examine Prince Andovan and discuss his debilitating ailment. Cynical southern Magister Colivar confirms that Andovan has the incurable “Wasting.” What the Magisters know, and what nobody else must ever learn, is that the Wasting is caused by the Magisters themselves, who drain their “consorts” of life-essence in order to power their magic. When the consort dies, the Magister simply fastens on another victim. Meanwhile, ill-used, red-headed peasant girl Kamala, who has powerful sorcery (but is reckoned a witch, since she has no consort) demands that reclusive Magister Ethanus train her to become a Magister. Ethanus carefully explains that women cannot ever become Magisters due to some constitutional weakness. Kamala persists nonetheless and—no surprise—becomes the first female Magister. With her vast power but poor control, she needs to pose as a mere witch in order to learn. Colivar, meanwhile, perceives that the cause of Andovan’s Wasting is an unknown female with magisterial powers. Andovan, determined to learn the truth, plots with Colivar to fake his suicide. Royal Magister Ramirus and Danton are fooled by Andovan’s fatal plummet from the rooftops; furious, Danton dismisses Ramirus and hires the ill-favored and sinister Kostas to replace him. Kamala, when molested by a Magister, kills her antagonist—thus becoming a target for other Magisters to hunt down and slay. Among other complications, the long-suppressed conflict between the warrior-heroes of old and their adversaries, the demons, seems about to burst into flame.
Well-fashioned and often absorbing, if hampered by a dearth of sympathetic characters. A good start to the trilogy.Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2007
ISBN: 0-7564-0432-0
Page Count: 496
Publisher: DAW/Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2006
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.
A tightly wound caseworker is pushed out of his comfort zone when he’s sent to observe a remote orphanage for magical children.
Linus Baker loves rules, which makes him perfectly suited for his job as a midlevel bureaucrat working for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, where he investigates orphanages for children who can do things like make objects float, who have tails or feathers, and even those who are young witches. Linus clings to the notion that his job is about saving children from cruel or dangerous homes, but really he’s a cog in a government machine that treats magical children as second-class citizens. When Extremely Upper Management sends for Linus, he learns that his next assignment is a mission to an island orphanage for especially dangerous kids. He is to stay on the island for a month and write reports for Extremely Upper Management, which warns him to be especially meticulous in his observations. When he reaches the island, he meets extraordinary kids like Talia the gnome, Theodore the wyvern, and Chauncey, an amorphous blob whose parentage is unknown. The proprietor of the orphanage is a strange but charming man named Arthur, who makes it clear to Linus that he will do anything in his power to give his charges a loving home on the island. As Linus spends more time with Arthur and the kids, he starts to question a world that would shun them for being different, and he even develops romantic feelings for Arthur. Lambda Literary Award–winning author Klune (The Art of Breathing, 2019, etc.) has a knack for creating endearing characters, and readers will grow to love Arthur and the orphans alongside Linus. Linus himself is a lovable protagonist despite his prickliness, and Klune aptly handles his evolving feelings and morals. The prose is a touch wooden in places, but fans of quirky fantasy will eat it up.
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21728-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
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