Mordant, thrilling, all tangled up in heavy knots of double-crossing and magic.
The grand conclusion to a fantasy two-parter about a knight with the soul of a teenaged boy.
In The Knight (2003), Wolfe sent an American teenager into another world, a multitiered fantasy universe divided into seven different planes of existence. There, he became known as Sir Abel of the High Heart, a powerful knight with a sword, Eterne, that your average hero would kill for. Now, we find Abel having recently come back to the land of Mythgarthr. Although he’s aged some 20 years in the realm of Skye, the passing of time there doesn’t really seem to follow the standard rules, and, while he doesn’t seem very mature, he definitely isn’t a kid anymore. A seasoned warrior, Abel is in the midst of a struggle between the realm of King Arnthor against a race of Frost Giants intent on raiding south into the hotter lands to capture human slaves to work their fields. The Wizard’s first half allows Abel to tell about his struggles in this conflict, and he’s an engaging narrator, though given to the prolix. When Wolfe shifts the action away from Abel, though, and turns to the diplomatic efforts of his squires Svon and Toug (and Mani, the speaking cat: less gimmicky than it sounds) in their effort to stop the giant-human fighting, the action shifts into high gear and the comprehension factor (despite the upfront list of dramatis personae) begins ratcheting dramatically downward. Wolfe likes to spin spiderwebs of plot and counterplot inside his impressively constructed universes, and fortunately his innate sense of humor keeps matters from getting impossibly dense. Even as he trots out the fantasy tropes (elf-like beings, a battle with a dragon, jousting matches, honorable peasants, arrogant royalty), he both undercuts expectations and fulfills them in each and every page.
Mordant, thrilling, all tangled up in heavy knots of double-crossing and magic.Pub Date: Nov. 10, 2004
ISBN: 0-765-31201-8
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2004
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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