Shorefall offers a natural thematic progression from the great Foundryside, further expanding the link between technology and oppression while presenting a memorable antagonist that challenges the protagonist’s worldview, daring her to find a better solution for society than his tyrannical nihilism.
When she was a slave in a plantation, doctors experimented on Sancia. Scriving is the skill that alters the properties of an object through a series of written commands, but instead of an object, the doctors were attempting to create a scrived person: a slave with special attributes, extremely powerful but also incapable of disobedience. Sancia, however, was granted the ability to [...]
The Gutter Prayer presents an imaginative fantasy world populated by so many different horrors – eldritch and scientific – that its inhabitants live in a constant state of fear and shock. Its plot may be convoluted, but this only reinforces the overwhelming feeling that besieges the characters, who are hopelessly manipulated by unforgiving, inscrutable forces.
The book opens with a description of the city of Guerdon, marking the importance of the setting to the story. Guerdon is presented as a derelict place haunted by its past, the urge to escape from it, and its inability to do so. As the narrator describes it, “Guerdon has always been a place in tension with itself, a city [...]
This review contains spoilers.
The first novel of the His Dark Materials trilogy, Northern Lights (the American title is The Golden Compass) is a fascinating fantasy novel that envelops a child’s adventure in an enticing theological debate: the protagonist’s journey into the North to save her friends is wrapped around discussions about sin, guilt, and the nature of the human soul.
We follow Lyra Belacqua, a young orphan girl who lives in Jordan College in a fantastical world that is much like ours, but with one crucial distinction: in her world, a part of each person’s soul lives beside them, assuming an animal form – and these beings are called daemons. One day, Lyra [...]
Foundryside is a great urban fantasy novel set in a world where people can change the properties of matter – an ability held by powerful merchant houses that monopolize knowledge to maximize profit and control the city of Tevanne with an iron fist.
The protagonist is Sancia, a young thief with a very special ability: she can “communicate” with any object she touches with her bare skin, feeling what it feels, seeing its strengths and weakness, and also its history – where it has been, what hands have touched it. Although using it hurts her, it’s still a very useful talent for a thief to possess, as she can sense what any vault contains without opening it, among other [...]
The final chapter of The Divine Cities trilogy, City of Miracles treads a familiar path, putting an old side character, Sigurd je Harkvaldsson, under the spotlight, once more having to deal with a divine threat and humans who yearn for violence. Although it never reaches the same heights as its predecessor, the novel represents a solid conclusion to the series written by Robert Jackson Bennet.
After a dear friend is assassinated, Sigurd goes on a quest for revenge. He thinks of himself as a blunt instrument and now intends to strike hard and true at the killers without caring about his wellbeing. However, he soon uncovers a plot that may threaten his friend’s daughter, [...]
City of Blades – the second book in The Divine Cities trilogy written by Robert Jackson Bennett – manages to easily surpass its already great predecessor. The novel offers a complicated discussion on the problem of soldiering, juxtaposing the idealized purpose of the military with their real one in a narrative tinged with blood and violence, but also deeply melancholic.
The story follows Saypury General Turyin Mulaghesh in her trip to the city of Voortyashtan, in Continental territory, after she’s requested to come back from retirement by her friend, the new prime minister. Her mission is to remain a secret at all costs: Mulaghesh must solve the disappearance of a young female [...]