It has taken a while to get here, and there's been a lot of painstaking world-building along the way, but Juliet McKenna's five-book series pays dividends with this final volume. Everything that has been set up so far comes back into play - and there's not a false note to be heard as every single character acts according to their...erm... character and stray deus ex machinas are denied admittance.Livak's long journey has taken her to Suthyfer, where Temar is rebuilding the long-lost colony, but she has no particular quest in mind - she's more concerned with making a future for herself and Ryshad. But Suthyfer is a long, long way from mainland civilisation, and the colony is only as secure as its supply routes. Worse still, the pirates intent on causing trouble are assisted by Elietimm Artifice. This isn't a straight-forward battle to the death, even though the fate of the colony depends on overwhelming their foes - McKenna has always been careful to keep the moral and political dimensions to her plots and characters intact, and The Assassin's Edge is no different. The pirate Muredarch has designs on the colony himself, the Elietimm have their own agenda, and the wizards of Hadrumal must decide how openly they can involve themselves in the struggle. This last aspect actually draws the greatest tragedy and though you can understand why the wizards have kept themselves apart, you do end up shouting at Planir - "For god's sake do something, man!"Muredarch's pirates are also foully moral in their own way. They have rules, and woe betide anyone who breaks them. Their violence is almost more shocking than that of the series's main Bad Guy, the Elietimm warlord Ilkehan. McKenna doesn't gloss over the violence, but nor does she give her characters extended emotional farewells. Once they get their heads smashed in, that's it. To take the sting from the bluntness, the characters Sorgrad and Sorgren are delightfully proto-Abercrombian (this came before The First Law, remember).Unforgivably, I actually abandoned this series quite quickly when it first came out. I think the split first/third-person narratives put me off. Time and maturity have put me right. Recommended to any reader who likes their characters and plots to have real intelligence.
http://nhw.livejournal.com/422672.html[return][return]The fifth in Juliet McKenna's Einarinn series, of which I am a moderate fan (see third and fourth books previously). Once again, competently done, and most of the threads from the first four books pulled together (though I did want to hear more of the lascivious island race from book #2). Among McKenna's strengths (others are mentioned in my previous reviews) are decent battle scenes - just enough detail to make you feel that it's a confusing, violent situation to be in, without at the same time confusing the reader (or at least this reader). There's also a wonderfully described bath scene. And the final confrontations with the bad guys are most satisfying. I was slightly surprised, though it's not really a criticism, by the low-key tone of the final wrap-up chapters after the plot is basically over; I'd somehow expected something more dramatic after five books and 2500 pages. But perhaps McKenna is just trying to tell us that life goes on.
