THE JAGGED CROWN

A diverse group of heroes gathers to battle a witch who can destroy the world in this epic fantasy debut.

It is the Ninth Age of the Fire Horse, and a great evil prepares to consume the world. Tregha is a Forest Ranger hunting for Dagghu warriors in the Arun Delta. The Rangers operate under the leadership of Lord Adfir and hope to meet with the Southern Patrol soon. Tregha is actually half Dagghu, the illegitimate son of Chief Knamu, who used magic to impregnate Lady Lylhanne, an Elf Trueblood hostage. Tregha’s dark stoicism helps keep his monstrous Dagghu heritage in check. When Adfir returns from scouting with a Fennelora priestess named Astoriie, Tregha sees someone who lives in perfect harmony with nature—someone to admire. After learning that the Southern Patrol has been destroyed, the Rangers find themselves battling the animated corpses of their comrades. Astoriie senses an all-consuming evil supporting the Dagghu warriors, who’ve grown bolder. The primary hope standing against this dark force is the wizard Aenrindel of Ellendor. As the wizard travels with a caravan across the Rall’Haku desert to the city of Kabir, he’s accompanied by a young monk called Luo. The 9-year-old child has been instructed by Master Su of the Long Fang Temple to guard Aenrindel but also to eliminate him if he’s seduced by evil. When several cars from the caravan mysteriously vanish into the desert’s red mists, the group steps onto the long road of confrontation with the witch Kakista. Can heroes with both physical and magical might stop her from killing the world?

In this series opener, Kalimeris brings together different types of fantasy storytelling to forge a dense, palate-cleansing adventure. Some readers will respond to motifs similar to those in classics like Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings series, such as races of elves, dwarfs, and the fellowship-style banding together of heroes. Fans of darker fantasy works, including Stephen Erikson’s Gardens of the Moon (1999), will appreciate the parade of fresh concepts that seem almost disposable in their profusion. There are, for example, several elaborately conceived character origins shuffled into the larger story that often enforce an episodic pacing. In a flashback, readers learn of Ryn Kartashee, a “warrior poet” who’s owned by Prince Qelek of Kabir and whose prowess in the fighting pits earns him the love of Harinni, the royal’s betrothed. Ryn and Harinni’s story is grand in its own right, but readers may need patience while the primary narrative rotates slowly back into view. The author’s prose is lean on dialogue, frequently requiring readers to submit to lengthy descriptions of scenes both violent and bucolic. When Navardi, the Chosen of the Sun God Ra, battles an army, “the searing heat soon filled the air with the stench of roasting flesh as ten thousand men cooked at once.” Such violent moments are outnumbered by paeans to nature, as in the passage “Spry flowers in white, gold, and purple pose in the petticoats, millions of tiny dancers suspended mid-lift in the steady hands of their betrothed.” Overall, the imagination on display is remarkable. Yet the equally amazing characters need more space to breathe and potentially carry a less cluttered, more emotionally resonant tale.

A sprawling fantasy that’s an inventive love letter to the genre.