Dragon Brigade Series, Volume One
Margaret Weis & Robert Krammes
Daw Books Inc.
May 2011/ ISBN 978-0-7564-0662-2
Epic Military Fantasy
Amazon
Reviewed
by P.L. Blair
Dragons Soar,
Magic Falls in New Weis/Krammes Epic
Magic is the
Breath of God, and something – despite all the beliefs and
teachings of the Church – is destroying it. That's the premise
of Shadow Raiders, Book One in a new epic fantasy series by Margaret
Weis and Robert Krammes that promises plenty of swashbuckling action,
magic and dragons.
Set on the
world of Aeronne, where landmasses float on the Breath of God –
and where the Church, reminiscent of the Roman Catholic Church of
our own Middle Ages, keeps a heavy hand in politics and brooks no
deviation from its teachings – Shadow Raiders deals as much
in intrigue as in action.
And there's
plenty of action once the plot gets rolling: A convent of nuns killed
by bat-riding demons – demons who also attack ships that travel,
by magic, across the ocean-like Breath of God … demons capable
of destroying that magic …
My one quibble
with the work – and it's strictly personal – is that
the plot doesn't really start becoming obvious until about a quarter
into this 531-page book. It begins with an eight-page Prologue that
is expendable … and Weis and Kramme consistently interrupt
plot-moving action with paragraphs of background information that
(again, strictly my opinion) could be better handled in shorter
snippets either as dialog or through a character's thoughts.
Occasionally,
after some of the longer paragraphs of digressions, I found myself
having to go back and pick up the thread of the action. Still, when
the authors do focus on the plot, they demonstrate a masterful ability
to interweave action with the complex intrigues of Church and State.
They also succeed
in creating a cast of memorable characters, headed by Lord Captain
Stephano de Guichen and Father Jacob Northrup, two men I found likable
not merely in spite of their flaws but, in an odd way, because of
them. I found the dialog believable, and the authors' descriptions
– from the lay of city streets to the clothes their characters
wear – present vividly visual images.
The authors
can soar to poetic heights in describing the workings of their world's
magic. Here, for example, Stephano's reaction when the Trundler
girl, Gythe, begins singing magic into visibility: “He saw
sigils, simple and complex. He saw the lines connecting them, myriad
lines, myriad sigils, blue-and-purple shining lights, dazzling and
beautiful. And confused. Like a spider spinning web over web over
web ...”
Shadow
Raiders is a slower-paced book than I usually choose to read,
and I found myself growing occasionally impatient. But then the
plot captured me, with enough questions to keep me reading, wanting
to know … What happens next? So … I'm hooked, and I
look forward to the next book in this series.
Reviews of other titles in this series
Shadow
Raiders [Review
1] [Review
2]
Reviewer's
Note: suitable for YA and older
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