Nice touches but largely familiar hop-hop-hop kid stuff that never rises to the dramatically big or spineshaking.
A fantasy debut from the pseudonymous Fisher (The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Visual Companion), an established English fantasy/SF publisher and expert on J.R.R. Tolkien. Here, the aging master magician Rahe seemingly goes mad in Sanctuary, his arctic ice palace, and begins destroying the pathways to magic that he has taught Virelai, his 29-year-old sorcerer’s apprentice. Rahe reduces and feeds his spells into his black cat Bète. In the process, he reveals to Virelai, by way of a scrying lens, the horrors and beauties of Elda and the island-kingdom of Eyra in the lands beyond Sanctuary, as well as the naked body of a supernally beautiful woman with silver hair (and no memory), a vision that stirs Virelai’s member to its first-ever hardening (at 29, somewhat delayed). Upset, Virelai leaves a poisoned meal for Rahe, catnaps Bète and her bellyful of magic spells, and sails away from Sanctuary to see a world unknown. Meanwhile on Eyra, red-haired Katla Aransen, 19 and hungry for the world, with her twin brother Fent and merchant father, arrives by sail at the Moonfell Plain and the mount that Eyrans call Sur’s Castle, to attend the Allfair and sell Katla’s famous knives. Katla, a supernaturally gifted rock climber as well as blade-maker, commits sacrilege by climbing the sacred Falla’s Rock, as the Istrians call Sur’s Castle, her blasphemy doubled by her sex. Thus the Istrian elders declare death to Katla. Also arriving at the Allfair—to sell their bloodstock of tricksy and skittish colts—are the Vingo clan, and, after them, shimmering, pulsing caravans of magic nomads called the Footloose. At once, hearts groan as romances twist and turn. Also on hand are the glorious beauty scryed by Rahe, who causes all men to feel fire within.
Nice touches but largely familiar hop-hop-hop kid stuff that never rises to the dramatically big or spineshaking.Pub Date: July 2, 2002
ISBN: 0-7564-0083-X
Page Count: 528
Publisher: DAW/Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2002
At Buckkeep in the Six Duchies, young Fitz, the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, is raised as a stablehand by old warrior Burrich. But when Chivalry dies without legitimate issue—murdered, it's rumored—Fitz, at the orders of King Shrewd, is brought into the palace and trained in the knightly and courtly arts. Meanwhile, secretly at night, he receives instruction from another bastard, Chade, in the assassin's craft. Now, King Shrewd's subjects are imperiled by the visits of the Red-Ship Raiders—formidable warriors who pillage the seacoasts and turn their human victims into vicious, destructive zombies. Since rehabilitating the zombies proves impossible, it's Fitz's task to go abroad covertly and kill them as quickly and humanely as possible. Shrewd orders that Fitz be taught the Skill—mental powers of telepathy and coercion possessed by all those of the royal line; his teacher is Galen, a sadistic ally of the popinjay Prince Regal, who hates Fitz all the more for his loyalty to Shrewd's other son, the stalwart soldier Verity. Galen brutalizes Fitz and, unknown to anyone, implants a mental block that prevents Fitz from using the Skill. Later, Shrewd decrees that, to cement an alliance, Verity shall wed the Princess Kettricken, heir to a remote yet rich mountain kingdom. Verity, occupied with Skillfully keeping the Red-Ship Raiders at bay, can't go to collect his bride, so Regal and Fitz are sent. Finally, Fitz must discover the depths of Regal's perfidy, recapture his true Skill, win Kettricken's heart for Verity, and help Verity defeat the Raiders. An intriguing, controlled, and remarkably assured debut, at once satisfyingly self-contained yet leaving plenty of scope for future extensions and embellishments.
Pub Date: April 17, 1995
ISBN: 0-553-37445-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Spectra/Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1995
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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