The Premise
Once humanity was enslaved by the Skasloi, a race of powerful creatures - until a woman of equal power lead them to their freedom. Now, thousands of years later, the descendants of these conquerors face a new threat.
In Review
Greg Keyes has gathered together some of the usual parts of a fantastic series, and crafted them into a story that once again attracted first my interest, and then my allegiance. I am attached to the fate of his characters, and look forward to questions resolved, obstacles met, and an epic struggle completed.
I have bashed other fantasy tales for their reliance on conventions, yet here I support a writer who uses them. Complementing my piece of humble pie is a reminder of the particular entertainment that a good fantasy tale can provide: heroes in the making; prophesies that make individuals super-significant against the backdrop of larger conflicts; single-combat; powers and creatures which evade empirical definition; and the prospect of terra incognita.
Keyes's fantasy adventure can be fixed in a medieval setting with knights, queens, kings, and other expected elements. Normally I don't go for this stuff, but Keyes adds mythology and history that complicates the story in interesting ways. His characters come from different lands and remember historical events differently. They also use different names and words for rivers and forests, and discuss these etymological variants with curiosity that feels genuine. As in the actual history I've read, the background that Keyes has created is a messy morass of subjectivity. None of his characters understand everything that's going on, or where it's all going.
Keyes does include one wrinkle that is common to the genre: the aforementioned super-significance of the individual. The cast involved in the world-shaking events and intrigue is small and relatively privileged. They obviously depend upon the ordered governance of everyone else - but this latter part of the population is missing. Unlike Guy Gavriel Kay (one of my favorite writers in the genre), Keyes does not draw secondary characters from the masses and stand them alongside the heroes.
Students and followers of history will scrutinize this and other aspects of the tale, and shake their heads; I did, but then, I was grinning at the same time, because it didn't matter. This is fun reading, and after 600 pages, many questions remain and the wider story has just begun.
On to book the second.
2/3/08
