****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
I've been a fan of Bradley P. Beaulieu's for awhile (enjoyed his "Lays of Anuskaya" series) and am happy he found a new publisher. I heard good things about this particular book before I read it, and I was not disappointed.The book is familiar, in a way, because it contains a lot of familiar elements: a pit fighter, rulers deemed by many in the population to be tyrannical, a resistance movement, searching ancient texts for information, a character who doesn't know about her mother's past (and hence, her own family background), etc. But, I think Beaulieu puts an interesting spin on these. The setting has been described as similar to a city that would've been on the Silk Road (if we were comparing to actual human history). I can see this, most definitely. Many of the character names are Turkish-sounding, but the desert sands are reminiscent of other parts of the Middle East. It works nicely, I think.At any rate, it's NOT pseudo-medieval Europe, so the setting is a nice change of pace. (It's also refreshing that female characters have freedom to go about their lives, run businesses, etc., that gender stereotypes typically abounding in pseudo-Middle Eastern fantasy settings are not mindlessly repeated here. As an example, the Kings of the title have female bodyguards, the heroine -- Ceda -- lives with a male best friend (Emre) to whom she is not married and is not shunned for improper behavior, etc.The pit fighter, Ceda, is a woman, but I feel like some thought was put into how she would succeed against opponents who were larger and/or physically stronger. She adapts well to a lot of situations, she is confident and capable, but sometimes her actions do not have the intended effects. In an attempt to get revenge against someone who did wrong against Emre's family, she inadvertently strains her relationship with Emre, for example. We learn a lot about Ceda's and Emre's relationship in flashback scenes. I'm not always a fan of flashback scenes, but I think they work here. Information is revealed bit by bit and everything is relevant, not just to Ceda's character but to the movement of the plot of this book and the overall series arc. Emre is not as compelling for me, early on, as Ceda is, but as we learn more about him during the course of the book, I am more interested in him. I can't help but wonder if he is getting in over his head, with some of the things he does. Ceda has often come to his aid and that may be less likely to happen as time goes on, we will have to see what becomes of him as he starts to make his own way in the world.What I really like is that the characters are not perfect, that things are not black and white, and that there are a lot of sides to every issue in this book. For example, Ceda starts the book determined to continue her mother's quest to rid Sharakhai of its Kings. But she is not enthusiastic about the tactics of some members of the resistance, even though they share her goal. We read about the daily lives of people in Sharakhai and think, "this is not so bad," but then we remember retribution visited on the daughters of the people when one of the kings' daughters (their bodyguards mentioned earlier) is killed, or about how people are chosen as sacrifices, so to speak, for the asirim (mysterious beings who roam the streets of Sharakhai one night every six weeks). And thus you are reminded some of the reasons why people might hate the Kings. These different perspectives and sides set up possibilities for shifting loyalties, trust issues, etc.The writing is polished, but I have come to expect that from Beaulieu. The style of the book is such that I was drawn in quickly. I started this book when I was using a sheet mask on my face one night, and I kept finding excuses to use more sheet masks over the next few nights (even though I didn't have much time) so I could read more. The book is not entirely action scenes, which is fine. (It sort of gives a bigger impact to the action scenes that do exist.) There's a bit of court intrigue, a bit of (secretive) scholarly research, a bit of prophecy (but not slavish adherence to something written a long time ago -- more trying to interpret flashes of scenes or visions), -- in short, many of the things that drew me to reading fantasy in the first place.I'm definitely looking forward to the next volume. I want to see how a particular event at the end of volume one changes Ceda's feelings about her mission -- does it cement her determination to complete her mother's quest, does she have mixed feelings, are there going to be consequences for her and/or for the city and the Kings?
