In Book I of this trilogy, The Ladies of Mandrigyn, it starts out with the action "over"-the mercenary troup is celebrating a victory. In Book 2 of this trilogy, The Witches of Wenshar, it begins with an argument between Sun Wolf and a witch.So Barbara Hambly starts the concluding book of this trilogy with a bang--Sun Wolf gets shot in the back with an arrow on page one. And we are off into Hambly's usual skilled blend of adventure and characterization. There are lots of battles and escapes and pursuits and magic duels--all well written and satisfying.The Dark Hand of Magic also explores further growth in the character of Sun-Wolf. His old mercenary troop has asked for his help to prevent them from being killed by an enemy wizard in a seige. There is an excellent scene where the Wolf must choose between saving his former warrior friends or Starhawk's life.Also, for the first time in his life, Sun-Wolf sees the opposite of a seige---from inside the beseiged city--and suddenly realizes what had happened before to the losers in his previous battles. Intellectually he knew what happened, of course, now he has changed and matured and feels it emotionaly.Besides Sun Wolf and Starhawk, there is excellent characterization of the members of his fomrmer mercenary troop, a fleshing out of characters only briefly met in book one.Aslo, well written is the character of Moggin--an odd name but a well written character--and I won't spoil it by saying more.But the scenes in which MOggin appears are among my favorite in the book. Look for him.This is a worthy end of the trilogy and well up to Hambly's usual standards.( I did notice, however, that she left the door open to a possible Book 4 in the ending. Barbara, are you reading this? Hint, Hint.....
My enjoyment of this trilogy peaked with the first book, The Ladies of Mandrigyn, which is fantastic. And, sadly, decreased from there. This book follows the further adventures of Sun Wolf and Starhawk, now reunited with their mercenary band, which is threatened by a mysterious magical force bent on causing every kind of catastrophe imaginable.One of the nice things about this trilogy is that each book has a self-contained plot arc, but they also build on one another. Given all the changes in our protagonists over the last two books, a good portion of this one is spent on their renegotiating their roles within the troop, which does not make everyone happy.Overall, this was an entertaining read, though somewhat slow going (Hambly’s style is a little dense for genre fantasy) and a bit on the darker side. I enjoyed the continued story of Sun Wolf and Starhawk, but missed the great secondary cast from the previous books, especially Mandrigyn. Here very little personality accumulates in the secondary cast, and the mercenaries almost all felt interchangeable to me. At any rate, this is worth reading if you enjoyed the first two and happen across a copy, but you probably don’t need to hunt one down to make your reading experience complete.
Do You like book The Dark Hand Of Magic (1997)?
Meh. I read the whole book but there was too much misery and not enough solution. I also didn't like the way that Sun Wolf and Starhawk related. Not as good as the others, but good train reading at the beginning and the end.
—Judy
The main issue I had with this story is that the Wolf, supposedly a strong, fearless leader, is reduced to whiny tears when he is overcome by magic. Having been raised on stories of Conan the Barbarian, I could not help but compare the Wolf to Conan, to the detriment of Wolf. I understand that Hambly is attempting to portray a strong woman in a powerful role with the Hawk, but it became a bit much when the Hawk internalizes a dialogue about having to save the Wolf – again, and having to save the troop – again. We do see the Wolf working to overcome the geas laid upon him, but it seems that, at least in matters of magic, he gives his trust too easily, especially for a leader of men. (view spoiler)[ Near the end of the book we see the Hawk bring this up, as she tells the Wolf that he has gone about learning magic the wrong way, that he needs to learn to use his current knowledge and strengthen his skills before seeking more knowledge. Isn’t that what any trainer would do? A teacher usually makes sure a student knows basic math before bringing on the algebra. The Wolf wanted to go from basic counting (night vision enhancement) to advanced calculus (magic spellcasting) – which is laudable but stupid. (hide spoiler)]
—Doris
