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The Duchies
of Harcia and Clemen share an island with only the Marches
between them and their warring. Harcia is ruled well enough
by Duke Aimery, but his heir is the dissolute and cruel Balfre.
Clemen is ruled badly by the unpopular Duke Harald, but is
bastard Roric going to be a better ruler despite his outward
sensibilities? Meanwhile in Ardenn, Duchess Berardine is in
a position normally only held by men, and hoping her daughter
is going to make a dynastic marriage…
Once fantasies were all about quests a la Tolkein, but since
the popularity of Game of Thrones they are all about courts,
scheming and politics. This is very much one of the latter,
and if you are a fan of this type of fantasy, it is a good
read. Miller has populated her novel with many interesting
characters which are mostly shades of gray rather than black
and white. This means they power the story rather than the
plot being a device to move them around like pieces on a game
board and is the main reason that keeps the pages turning.
Often when it looked as though one rather predictable event
was going to happen something totally different did, a nice
touch. I have read most of her other books and find this one
a departure from her usual style, for Miller has penned a
dark tale. Nobody is safe and everybody has plenty of suffering
to do before anything positive can come of it, but then this
is only the first book in a trilogy. One feature I was less
keen on was the bizarre slang that some of the characters
use; this didn't seem to add anything to the ambience and
got annoying rather quickly. Overall this was not that important,
but I do look forward to learning more about the world in
the subsequent books including a religion that most people
don't have much time for and some more back history. Like
many first books in a series, this one sets up all the various
stories (quite a few of these) and goes forward about twenty
years. It will be interesting to see where Miller takes the
story next.
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