2014 fantasy, third of a tetralogy. Princess Katya is with the royal
family, trying to drum up support for an army to retake the capital
and depose the usurper. Her lover Starbride is hiding in the capital,
gathering information and building a resistance.
Last year I wrote "I assume volume three will have a similar
sense of marking time." Well, I was right. But it does it well. Book
two was a little better than book one, and this is substantially
better than book two; these are real people at least, some of whom are
even allowed to disagree with the protagonists without being Wrong.
We finally see the under-race Allusians in their native habitat, and
their "useless" style of magic; yeah, it's a bit Star Wars Force and a
bit magical natives, but the fact that both sides's visualisations of
the thing work, and that they have some abilities in common and
others not, suggests that once they start talking with each other
properly there's going to be a revolution in magical theory quite as
profound as the revolution in governance as a near-absolute monarchy
is forced by circumstance to have a parliament and other modern
trappings.
Yes, it's a bit middle-volume getting people into position for the
actually exciting events of the final book, but the potential for
amazing things to happen in that book is huge; there are all sorts of
huge questions left open, and I hope Wright brings it all together in
a satisfying way.
Also the villain has clearly thought about the implications of the
magic available to him, and has all sorts of tricks involving a
variety of means of rewriting people's minds to make them loyal to
him. This can actually get pretty nasty at times; but he's a nasty
person, and smart, so it makes sense.
There are still the problems of previous volumes, such as the system,
of nobility feeling rather un-thought-out, but perhaps because the
focus has shifted from court politics to army-raising and generally
doing stuff, I didn't find them as obtrusive. Even the magic system
is finally coming into its own.
(Though I still find it hard to take seriously a senior henchman
called Darren. Presumably the US didn't have the wave of popularity of
that name in the 1970s that the UK did.)
This book ends right in the middle of the action, so if you're the
sort of person who cares about that, have volume 4 handy.
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