This striking tale whips up a fresh storm in familiar fantasy territory.
A debut fantasy sees a corrupt empire crumbling as enemies from within and without exact vengeance.
On the world of Urrael, the Sindathi Empire stretches across the continent of Terryth. In the 22nd year of Emperor Thelden III Arrigar’s rule, a column of Imperial Guardsmen breached the forested Kingdom of Sunset. They skirmished with the Aelfen people to retrieve a silver-haired boy, the emperor's bastard grandson. Ten years later, that boy is the princeling Drake, who’s been raised alongside Crown Prince Baildan and his twin brother, Cirrus, in the city of Arleon. Drake knows five languages and practices sorcery, but one subject with which he’d love to become better acquainted is the alluring handmaiden Leasha. Celebrating her 16th birthday, she, Drake, and her upstanding cousin Darius visit the Whirling Blade tavern. The fun ends when a drunken Baildan gives salacious attention to Leasha. Fearing that she’ll be manhandled, Drake lets loose a magical fireball that scorches the establishment’s ceiling. He’s found guilty of attempting to assassinate Baildan and is exiled to the far-flung posting of Icegate. Meanwhile, Darius, an Initiate in the Order of the Golden Path, is raised by the emperor to be Champion of the First Rank. His first mission as a soldier brings him to the hamlet of Ferrin, which revolts against Gov. Bravard. Darius is second-in-command under 1st Capt. Jarvis, who quells the rebellion with merciless violence. But when Darius learns that Bravard has been raping the girls of Ferrin, his role as a Champion becomes that much more urgent. Sterling’s lushly realized novel should scratch the itch for those awaiting more material from Game of Thrones mastermind George R.R. Martin. Terryth is an aggressively horrible place, bristling with religious and political complexities, mainly in service to Ryack, the Empire’s patron deity. Narrative sparks come from the ways in which Drake, Leasha, and Darius strive to assert their humanity with malicious forces coiling around them. As Drake imagines dying a traitor’s death, Sterling writes, “His mortal soul would be forbidden Ryack’s Aetherial embrace so that upon his expiration it would have no refuge from consumption within the Everdeep, that dread ocean of half-understood madness that awaits all who die heretics.” Fantasy elements never crowd out the human moments—which often involve suffering—but when scenes like the battle between Drake and the gigantic, hammer-wielding Vendigon occur, they bring the adventure a feverish, anything-can-happen vibe. Most riveting is Sterling’s portrayal of faith. When Darius faces Ferrin’s rebel Champion, Uldar, the man is able to summon the light and strength of Ryack because “the Order does not have a monopoly on righteousness.” While Drake, who is half-Aelfen, and Leasha, a young servant, know the hypocritical core of the Empire too well, it’s the honorable Darius whose hopes are dashed the worst. The finale to this first volume in a trilogy is staggeringly violent, made all the more effective because readers have seen the characters through both trial and mirth.
This striking tale whips up a fresh storm in familiar fantasy territory.Pub Date: Oct. 30, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9992020-0-5
Page Count: 444
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
