Exotic landscapes and arcane inner monologues add intriguing texture but too little substance to this medieval tale.
A debut novel, the first installment of a historical fiction series, follows a knight stationed in the Levant during the Crusades.
In the stifling heat of the desert, Robert Simmonwood waits in a pit. A true knight driven by honor, duty, and his word above all else, he endures the harsh “land cursed with wasted blood and death,” waiting for a messenger with a secret that will help the king, who is “alone in a sea of hostility; not knowing who his real enemy was.” The messenger finally arrives, revealed to be a woman and an emissary of the mysterious Old Man of the Mountain. Robert brings her back to the ancient city of Acre, believing his mission is finally over. But he will meet her again as hostilities stirring in the Levant against the ruling Christian families lead them on a voyage to discover the truth about who might be disrupting the region’s fragile peace. Their paths will also cross with Venetian shipping mogul Lucca Ricci. Lucca rose from destitution through malice and cunning to rule “a most unsavory army of rogues and layabouts that served him in all manner of ways.” He has also come to the East in search of answers, and for his beloved grandson, whom he wants to save from the useless bloodshed of these interminable holy wars at any cost. Garner’s wistful and dense prose is evocative of ancient times and incredible settings, bringing to mind Umberto Ecco’s famous medieval murder mystery, The Name of the Rose. But while these long, thoughtful passages offer complexity to the characters’ points of view on the Crusades—they grapple with racism and occupation in a way that feels apt even for today—they do little to advance the action of the plot or even fully flesh out the historical context of the tale. Lengthy, vague tirades about distrust and medieval geopolitics never answer basic questions about geography, time period, or alliances. The author also gives supposed villain Lucca a full, rich back story while protagonist Robert remains dully adrift in the confusion. Beautiful as some of this book is, it’s a shaky foundation for a series.
Exotic landscapes and arcane inner monologues add intriguing texture but too little substance to this medieval tale.Pub Date: Nov. 28, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-78455-740-9
Page Count: 334
Publisher: AuthorHouseUK
Review Posted Online: April 6, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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