DIS PATER'S RAGE

In this fifth volume of an epic fantasy series, a hero uses time travel to thwart demonic hordes in the present.

In the magical realm of Kismeria, Adem Highlander, Wil Martyr, and Carl Wilder are the prophesied Sons of Odin, destined to battle the Shadow. Though Adem is devoted to and has a daughter with Jean Fairsythe, the Daughter of Thor, he also has a child with Princess Isabelle. Their adult son, Pendral, is in thrall to the evil Jinn-Lord, imprisoned in Kerak’Otozi, a volcanic mountain. To ensure that his son becomes an upstanding, compassionate man, Adem has been using Elarja RinHannen’s Time Stones to visit Pendral in the past, as a boy. Though Pendral’s demon army seems to be growing in the present, he appears conflicted while fighting the Sons of Odin and their allies. Meanwhile, Druid Allor MorKondeith creates a potion that alleviates the curse of creeping madness in those who use teran and terael magic. But Carl doesn’t appreciate the intoxicating side effects. Adem also begins to question his chances of gaining redemption and God’s forgiveness after all the violence of his warrior life. Could the Sons have a kind of PTSD from the event that brought them from Earth to Kismeria? Later, Elarja warns that too many visits to young Pendral have “the potential for great tragedy.” Hammer goes back to the deep imaginative well that has served him in the four prior volumes of this fantasy series. This volume explores father-son relationships and the missed opportunities therein. In the present, warrior Rayne Dragon-Sword battles Pendral, his own father, only to see his friends—Shaye, Ellagon, and Ragan—possessed by demons. And yet the author’s penchant for verbal and visual extravagance makes the characters’ personal dramas difficult to maintain (“Time was sliding into a puddle like gel. Space was constricted and at the same time stretched beyond containable proportions”). Magical action against countless creatures maximizes the gore. Euphoria-inducing potions and an herb called menuhybe, which is smoked, have obvious real-world parallels. A sweetly surprising finale expands the potential of subsequent volumes.

Readers craving another dose of superlative magic battles and ambitious plotting won’t be disappointed.