A mythical, disturbing tale with impressive worldbuilding and a memorable cast.
A queen and her people fight back against oppressive, beastly warriors that have seized their city in this debut fantasy.
Queen Nahar rules the desert city of Samandal alone, having lost her parents by the time she was 18 years old. This prosperous city resides on crucial trade routes that unite various regions. So Samandal’s Great Council is understandably worried when massive, “semi-human” raiders, the Mrrrg, overtake a neighboring town—a “major nexus” for the trade routes. Despite its efforts, the Samandal army can’t stop the Mrrrg’s mighty Dragon Horde from seizing the city. Paramount chieftain and warlord Timur sets his sights on Nahar even before his Dragon Horde reaches Samandal. As is typical for a savage Mrrrg, Timur forces himself on Nahar only to feel something beyond physical pleasure. Nahar, too, senses a deep connection while shamefully enjoying sex, even when other men rape and, at one point, whip her. Meanwhile, the captive citizens plot an escape, and Bahadur, the leader of the city’s temporarily useless Household Guard, spearheads a rebellion to retake Samandal. He starts by disrupting the profitable trade routes, which Timur has been exploiting. But the paramount chieftain also faces dissension within the Dragon Horde; his love for Nahar is a sign of weakness that some Mrrrg will take advantage of. As battles against the Mrrrg and humans increase, Nahar discovers an unusual way to acquire power. She must nevertheless choose a side—take back her throne or love an enemy of both Samandal and the human race.
Templeton’s epic story teems with melodrama, sporadic action, and eroticism. Many readers will be put off or deeply troubled by the explicit sex scenes, as they involve a woman aroused by rape. Although Timur and Nahar aren’t the only characters who are featured, the sex scenes can be repetitive. But the author does skillfully portray this tale’s intriguing world, from the lands surrounding Samandal to the myriad characters. For example, Samandal’s women, who oversee the city’s politics and finances, plan the escape from Mrrrg control using “bribes and seduction.” In the story, good and evil aren’t easily defined; not everyone is innocent in Samandal, which has a dark underbelly where killers and thieves thrive. While Templeton rarely misses an opportunity to describe Nahar’s somatic beauty, the author proves adept at portraying various characters, including Kashi, a wizard: “Mustachios curled under his hawk nose, and his beard, black but streaked with white, reached nearly to his waist.” The narrative’s action comes in bursts, which are often effective and a further display of the sharp prose: “The steeds of both warriors, well trained and tried in war, fought as well, each sensing from the shifting of his rider’s weight where and when he meant to strike, and swerving to place him at best advantage without need for direction.” The final act takes an odd but not entirely unexpected turn, and the story ends on a surprisingly lyrical note.
A mythical, disturbing tale with impressive worldbuilding and a memorable cast.Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2022
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 433
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 30, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
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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