Epic Fantasy can be the most confounding genre. At the heart of its appeal are two conflicting ideas: a wide canvas of imagination and a familiar set of tropes (character, story arc, setting, etc). So when a fantasy novel, which of course is the first of a series, comes along and defies those two seemingly opposed traits and forges something shiny and unique, one must take notice. Such is the case with Brad Beaulieu’s Twelve Kings in Sharakhai, the first novel of his new Shattered Sands series.
We begin in the fighting pits, witnessing 19-year old Çeda (pronounced Chayda) Ahyanesh’ala – known to many as the White Wolf – defeat a champion pit fighter, an opponent much larger and more experienced than her. An opponent of her own choosing. This opening was perfect, we get a sense of Çeda as a strong, deceptively imposing physical presence, a flavor of Sharakhai itself, and as the fight ends, a hint of her character and motivations. I dare say that if you aren’t drawn in by Bealieu’s powerful and magnetic opening, you should check yourself and/or your pulse.
Young Çeda is an orphan, having no idea of who her father is and having her mother’s life taken away when she was nine years old. She only has one person she can trust, another street orphan named Emre. The two have known each other for most of their lives and have grown up together. In a slight inversion, Emre (the boy) is often protected by Çeda (the girl) in many cases. Their relationship is, to be succinct and understated, complicated. While they don’t have the same parents, there is a brother-sister kinship between the two, but as they grow older a romantic/sexual tension develops between the two as well. Perhaps the most natural element, and one of the many standout elements of the novel, is their relationship.
So, how about the plot? It is, on the surface, relatively straightforward. Çeda seeks vengeance and an accounting for her mother’s death and she holds the Twelve Kings (of the title) responsible. She hones her fighting skills as a pit fighter and runs odd jobs for a local “organization.” Those aren’t only two roles she plays throughout the story, Çeda is very much a chameleon who adapts to her surroundings. While out of the pits, she feigns a bad leg to help deter people from suspecting her as the White Wolf. She pretends to honor those Twelve Kings against whom she seeks revenge in order to gain entrance to the elite Blade Maidens.
One of the great strengths of the novel is how inviting it is. Bealieu’s prose is comforting, Çeda is an incredibly likeable and empathetic protagonist, and the world of Sharakhai is a marvelous construct. It is something of a metropolis surrounded by a desert expanse. While the desert is a dry vastness, that doesn’t prevent shipping and port trade, Brad has devised a very clever and logical sand-ship method of transport. It was so well devised that it became easy enough to forget at times that the ships often referred to by the characters were being sand ships, rather than sea-going vessels. Strange creatures populate this world, in addition to the humans. There are vampiric/werewolf like asirim, frightening insects, terrifying canine creatures (wolf/hyena in description) to keep Çeda, Emre and the populace on their toes and to fuel their nightmares.
Complementing the geography and physicality of Sharakhai is the intriguing (and more to be revealed, I hope!), history, culture and background of the land and the Twelve Kings of the title. There’s a wonderful mythological aura to those Kings and their relation to the gods of the world. This mystery leaves much for interpretation by the characters as hundreds of years of history have blurred the actual events into something only the Kings themselves can accurately recount.
Bealieu’s prose is bolstered by the narrative techniques, namely the interweaving of Çeda’s past along with the current storyline. He jumps back, first eleven years, then five years into her past, showing events while Çeda was eight years old and her mother was still alive, then five years in the past when she was fourteen. Scott Lynch did this to great effect in his Gentleman Bastard sequence contrasting the life of a very young Locke Lamora with the more experienced thief known as the Thorn of Camorr. Not that Scott was the first (or even last or most recent) to employ such a narrative technique, but damn did Scott do it well. Brad is equal to the task; the parallel narrative is powerful, it kept me extremely intrigued in her story, both her past and her “present.”
There’s also a nice interplay of fantasy flavors here, the more intimate and personal elements closely associated with Sword and Sorcery against the larger scale (worldly) elements associated with Epic Fantasy. Through Çeda’s introduction in a fighting/gladiatorial pit, the feel is initially Sword and Sorcery, something that could very easily be compared to a Robert E. Howard Conan story. I would even say you could extract that opening/intro as a complete stand-alone Sword and Sorcery story, it is a powerful, adrenalizing tale. As the story develops, we learn that Çeda’s plight and quest for revenge has more global stakes.
Maybe because I follow Brad on Twitter, it was easy for me to see that he worked his ass off on this book. I’ve said it / intimated in previous reviews that one of the hallmarks of a great story is that the surface looks polished, but you get a sense a lot of effort went into making it that way. With Twelve Kings, especially that wonderful opening and introduction to Çeda, the polish is very shiny and beautiful through effort and skill.
So, what has Brad Beaulieu done with Twelve Kings in Sharakhai? Nearly everything he should have done in the opening volume of a new series.* I loved this book, want more of Çeda and I am fascinated by this world and its mythology (hint: I want to learn more about the Twelve Kings themselves).
More please.
Highly recommended.
* I tend to like maps and character lists/glossaries in books. Since I read the ARC, I don’t know if the final book has either of these, but Brad has been posting a lot of interesting reference information on his Web site http://quillings.com/2015/08/25/twelve-kings-tuesdays-the-kings/
For another view of the novel, my pal/colleague Mark Yon reviewed the UK version from Gollancz a couple of weeks ago: http://www.sffworld.com/2015/08/twelve-kings-by-bradley-beaulieu/
Hardcover, September 1, 2015, 592 Pages
ISBN 978-0-756-40972-2
http://quillings.com/fiction/twelve-kings-in-sharakhai/
http://quillings.com
Review copy courtesy of the publisher, DAW
So many glowing reviews of this book! OK, you’ve all convinced me:-) I’m getting myself a copy soon.
Great read, great protagonist, and some truly epic world building. My only complaint (and it’s a minor one) was the pacing. A very slow beginning, a lot of tangents, and an extended lull around the mid-point were a challenge, but the layers all added up to a deeper story.