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cyphomandraStarting off with massive thanks to Orannia for telling me about these and lending me her copies (I'm ordering my own shortly, although the trick is going to be not ordering a bunch of other unread books as well)...
Kiram Kir-Zaki is happy and well-adjusted, has a supportive (and surviving) family (he’s gay, so his mother tries to match him up with a nice young responsible male pharmacist) and no magical powers whatsoever, which makes him massively unlikely as the protagonist for a fantasy novel – I can’t remember the last one who fit all these criteria – but ideal for me to read about. He’s also the first Haldiim – a nonwhite ethnic minority – to attend the Sagrada Academy, an all-male quasi-military quasi-nobility training centre, by right of being an engineering prodigy, and because he has a cheerfully if cautiously atheistic attitude to the dominant Cadeleonian religion, he ends up sharing a room with Javier Tornesal, the only surviving heir of a cursed Dukedom, and apparently a soulless being with special powers. What ensues is two books of action, world-building, romance (complicated by the Cadeleonian objection to homosexuality), culture conflicts and blends of magic and technology, and the first secondary world fantasy I’ve really enjoyed for ages.
I liked the first book just a tiny bit better than the second – more focus on what I’ve heard referred to as “training neepery”, more of the early interactions with Javier, as well as the very believable conflict at the end of the book – but the second has got some great stuff about the Haldiim, and I really enjoyed meeting Kiram’s family and world. And, despite liking training info, I did also like that we don't get to see much of Javier’s training, because that felt true to Kiram’s viewpoint and also kept it his story. I do think the ending is just a tiny bit convenient, in a way, and if I had a critique of the novel set-up, it would be that Kiram’s mechanistic talents stick out a bit too much as a plot convenience, as does the Crown challenge; it’s never quite clear what the Academy gains by taking him, and he doesn’t spend a lot of time on other designs. But I liked so much else of it, and the nifty way in which Javier’s magic is, like many other things, taken from the Haldiim (and why this will destroy him) was very nicely done, along with how he deals with this and what it will mean.
Wicked Gentlemen. Two linked novellas in a semi-Victorian fantasy world, the first from the point of view of Belimai Sykes, a Prodigial – descended from demons, addicted to drugs, available for hire (as an investigator) and with a black past, and the second from William Harper’s point of view, a captain of the Inquisition who suppress the Prodigals, who also has a mysterious past and, in the opening novella, needs Belimai’s help. Complicating matters again is their relationship, which starts off as sexual and then develops emotionally, neither of which are particularly well tolerated by their worlds.
I didn’t like this as much as Lord of the White Hell; I still enjoyed bits of it, but the characters didn’t grab me as much (Belimai yes, despite his drug-injecting emo opening chapter, but not so much Harper – I think because I really liked Belimai’s back-story, and how it still had ongoing consequences for him, whereas Harper’s family past didn’t work that well for me) and the plots, partly because of the shorter length, don’t really get that unpredictable. I think also I am still looking for a city in fantasy where there is something between noble marble estates and the slums (Lord of the White Hell was better for this as well), and while I realise that the Prodigials have been systematically oppressed for a long time, Hells Below felt more like a setting than a place where any sort of society actually functioned. I believe the author’s working on a sequel, and I’ll definitely read it, but while I can see the advantages of the dual viewpoints I will be quietly hoping for all of it from Belimai (he does, at least, get the epilogue). Possibly shifting Harper also to first person (he’s in third, while Belimai’s in first) might have helped, although contrasting firsts doesn’t always work for me.
So, in summary, I really enjoyed Lord of the White Hell - Wicked Gentlemen less so, but it was written earlier, and so now I really want to see what she does next...
Kiram Kir-Zaki is happy and well-adjusted, has a supportive (and surviving) family (he’s gay, so his mother tries to match him up with a nice young responsible male pharmacist) and no magical powers whatsoever, which makes him massively unlikely as the protagonist for a fantasy novel – I can’t remember the last one who fit all these criteria – but ideal for me to read about. He’s also the first Haldiim – a nonwhite ethnic minority – to attend the Sagrada Academy, an all-male quasi-military quasi-nobility training centre, by right of being an engineering prodigy, and because he has a cheerfully if cautiously atheistic attitude to the dominant Cadeleonian religion, he ends up sharing a room with Javier Tornesal, the only surviving heir of a cursed Dukedom, and apparently a soulless being with special powers. What ensues is two books of action, world-building, romance (complicated by the Cadeleonian objection to homosexuality), culture conflicts and blends of magic and technology, and the first secondary world fantasy I’ve really enjoyed for ages.
I liked the first book just a tiny bit better than the second – more focus on what I’ve heard referred to as “training neepery”, more of the early interactions with Javier, as well as the very believable conflict at the end of the book – but the second has got some great stuff about the Haldiim, and I really enjoyed meeting Kiram’s family and world. And, despite liking training info, I did also like that we don't get to see much of Javier’s training, because that felt true to Kiram’s viewpoint and also kept it his story. I do think the ending is just a tiny bit convenient, in a way, and if I had a critique of the novel set-up, it would be that Kiram’s mechanistic talents stick out a bit too much as a plot convenience, as does the Crown challenge; it’s never quite clear what the Academy gains by taking him, and he doesn’t spend a lot of time on other designs. But I liked so much else of it, and the nifty way in which Javier’s magic is, like many other things, taken from the Haldiim (and why this will destroy him) was very nicely done, along with how he deals with this and what it will mean.
Wicked Gentlemen. Two linked novellas in a semi-Victorian fantasy world, the first from the point of view of Belimai Sykes, a Prodigial – descended from demons, addicted to drugs, available for hire (as an investigator) and with a black past, and the second from William Harper’s point of view, a captain of the Inquisition who suppress the Prodigals, who also has a mysterious past and, in the opening novella, needs Belimai’s help. Complicating matters again is their relationship, which starts off as sexual and then develops emotionally, neither of which are particularly well tolerated by their worlds.
I didn’t like this as much as Lord of the White Hell; I still enjoyed bits of it, but the characters didn’t grab me as much (Belimai yes, despite his drug-injecting emo opening chapter, but not so much Harper – I think because I really liked Belimai’s back-story, and how it still had ongoing consequences for him, whereas Harper’s family past didn’t work that well for me) and the plots, partly because of the shorter length, don’t really get that unpredictable. I think also I am still looking for a city in fantasy where there is something between noble marble estates and the slums (Lord of the White Hell was better for this as well), and while I realise that the Prodigials have been systematically oppressed for a long time, Hells Below felt more like a setting than a place where any sort of society actually functioned. I believe the author’s working on a sequel, and I’ll definitely read it, but while I can see the advantages of the dual viewpoints I will be quietly hoping for all of it from Belimai (he does, at least, get the epilogue). Possibly shifting Harper also to first person (he’s in third, while Belimai’s in first) might have helped, although contrasting firsts doesn’t always work for me.
So, in summary, I really enjoyed Lord of the White Hell - Wicked Gentlemen less so, but it was written earlier, and so now I really want to see what she does next...
