Tad Williams is a seminal writer for me and his Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy chronicling a tumultuous, war-torn Osten Ard sits atop my personal list of favorite fantasy series. It is the series George R.R. Martin very publicly pointed to as inspiration for his own saga, A Song of Ice and Fire. I’ve read the trilogy a few times so when Mr. Williams announced he’d be returning to Osten Ard I was excited, though a bit cautious. I thought the ending of the series wonderful and well-earned by the characters, and it even led to some tears being shed as I turned the final pages. The Heart of What Was Lost is the first of two major re-entries to the world of Osten Ard, the other being a major trilogy, The Last King of Osten Ard, which begins with The Witchwood Crown publishing in June 2017. Here’s the brief publisher description before my review begins.
A NOVEL OF OSTEN ARD
At the end of Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, Ineluki the Storm King, an undead spirit of horrifying, demonic power, came within moments of stopping Time itself and obliterating humankind. He was defeated by a coalition of mortal men and women joined by his own deathless descendants, the Sithi.
In the wake of the Storm King’s fall, Ineluki’s loyal minions, the Norns, dark cousins to the Sithi, choose to flee the lands of men and retreat north to Nakkiga, their ancient citadel within the hollow heart of the mountain called Stormspike. But as the defeated Norns make their way to this last haven, the mortal Rimmersman Duke Isgrimnur leads an army in pursuit, determined to end the Norns’ attacks and defeat their ageless Queen Utuk’ku for all time.
Two southern soldiers, Porto and Endri, joined the mortal army to help achieve this ambitious goal—though as they venture farther and farther into the frozen north, braving the fierce resistance and deadly magics of the retreating Norns, they cannot help but wonder what they are doing so very far from home. Meanwhile, the Norns must now confront the prospect of extinction at the hands of Isgrimnur and his mortal army.
Viyeki, a leader of the Norns’ military engineers, the Order of Builders, desperately seeks a way to help his people reach their mountain—and then stave off the destruction of their race. For the two armies will finally clash in a battle to be remembered as the Siege of Nakkiga; a battle so strange and deadly, so wracked with dark enchantment, that it threatens to destroy not just one side but quite possibly all.
Trapped inside the mountain as the mortals batter at Nakkiga’s gates, Viyeki the Builder will discover disturbing secrets about his own people, mysteries both present and past, represented by the priceless gem known as The Heart of What Was Lost.
Although I have already mentioned the closure and wonderful ending of To Green Angel Tower, the final novel of the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy, not everything was settled. The world still existed – spoiler, the war between Man and Sithi did not shatter the world. However, war is messy, especially when it engulfs the land. Just because an enemy is defeated, doesn’t mean there aren’t factions of the enemy still in parts of the world, which is part of what Tad Williams conveys to great effect in The Heart of What Was Lost.
Rather than focus on Simon and Miriamele, the hero and heroine of the original trilogy, the primary focus here is on Duke Isgrimnur (one of the more prominent secondary characters) and the fractured remains of the Norns. Isgrimnur was one of the larger than life characters in the original trilogy and provided some supporting view-points throughout, but he takes center stage here. Williams conveys the weary, aged soldier’s plight extremely well.
What Mr. Williams does with even greater skill is lend the “enemies” of the human armies – the ethereal Sithi – significant weight in terms of sympathy and empathy. Of course they oversaw some great atrocities at the behest of their now defeated Storm King Ineluki, but their part of the story has always been tragic and deep with the sorrow of things lost and dying. Not only are the Sithi fighting for the survival of their race, but also for their cultural identity.
As a fan of Memory, Sorrow and Thorn (I finished a third re-read of the series a couple of years ago), my memories of the series are relatively significant and recent. Opening the pages of The Heart of What Was Lost, it was enjoyable to re-engage with this world and the characters, and be reminded of just how much I enjoyed immersing myself in Osten Ard. And there’s the conundrum for this book…how will it work for readers unacquainted with either Memory, Sorrow and Thorn or Tad Williams’ writing? On one hand it is a short* enough book that it provides a nice sample of what to expect both from the writer and the flavor of the world. I don’t think that knowing how everything transpired in previous volumes takes away from what is essentially an “aftermath” novel. That is, knowing a great war was recently concluded may be enough to lend weight to the story in The Heart of What Was Lost and provide readers curious about both the world and Tad Williams’s writing to dive into this short novel. Of course, a familiarity with the characters does lend greater weight to their plight.
It is an excellent piece of fiction from that standpoint and from the standpoint of a fan of both Tad Williams and Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I’m even more excited to read The Witchwood Crown, the first volume of The Last King of Osten Ard in the spring.
*A rarity from Mr. Williams, the final installment of MST, To Green Angel Tower is one of the longest fantasy novels published at the time and had to be split into two volumes upon mass market paperback publication.
Recommended
© 2017 Rob H. Bedford
DAW, January 2017
Hardcover, 222 Pages
http://www.tadwilliams.com/
Review copy courtesy of the publisher, DAW
