The Bones of the Earth is the second book in Rachel Dunne’s Bound Gods trilogy, picking up hot on the heels of where she left the characters and story in In the Shadow of the Gods. The group of characters is somewhat fractured, primarily with Scal healing himself in exile away from the group he traveled with in the first book. More importantly, Dunne gives more narrative focus to Kiero, the young man who has been talking to the Twins, those sibling bound gods and his efforts to make them whole and raise them from their earthen prison.
To win the coming battle for control of the world and the mortals who dwell in it, the cunning priest Joros secretly assembled a team of powerful fighters—Scal, a lost and damaged swordsman from the North; Vatri, a scarred priestess who claims to see the future in her fires; Anddyr, a drug-addled mage wandering between sanity and madness; and Rora and Aro, a pair of twins who have secretly survived beyond the reach of the law.
But the war is only beginning for these disparate warriors and victory is far from certain when the enemy is a pair of vengeful gods. As the bound Twins strengthen in force against their parents—the Divine Mother and Almighty Father—who exiled them, a shadow begins to spread across the land, threatening to engulf all in its wake.
As deadly magic takes hold, the tenuous bonds tying these uneasy allies begins to unravel. If they cannot find a way to keep their band together, each of their lives—and the entire world—will be lost to the darkness, leaving nothing but the bones of the earth. . . .
The novel is fairly divided along three narrative paths: Kiero’s quest to reinvigorate the twins and break their shackles. Rora and Joros’ mission to destroy the bodyparts of the twins that have been scattered across the world, thus making it more difficult for the Twins to be whole again and have their full power. The third, and perhaps more understated narrative thread, follows Scal as he’s trying to atone for the sins of the many “lives” he’s lived and heal his wounds. Rora, Aro, Anddyr, and Joros are still together trying to hew to the faith of the Parents and destroy the scattered fragments of the Twins. What was initially off-putting came to help define a large portion of the narrative. Rora (our cover heroine) is a point of view character for large swathes of the novel. As such, Dunne wrote the story completely from Rora’s voice – even the non-dialogue passages employ her affectations.
The character of Anddyr is very much a scattered, neurotic individual. His powers are a bit overwhelming and he’s trying to recapture his identity. It makes for a character study that is at times frustrating, at times engrossing, and one that generates empathy throughout. In many ways, Anddyr’s journey is emblematic of the novel itself. There are some really good elements to Bones of the Earth: the continued delving and exploration of the world’s mythology, more “page time” for the Twins, and some really interesting character development. There’s also some unevenness: the plot moves with less urgency than the first novel and the book definitely has that middle book feel of treading a little bit of water.
Something that becomes clearer here in the second book of the trilogy is the haze of time and how that is affected by “whose side” is telling the story. The people who are aligned with keeping the Twins shackled claim they are evil, they follow the Parent gods who smote down their children. Conversely, the devotees of the Twins will paint a picture that casts the Parent gods as the evil gods. Because this is a wholly created world, knowing the truth is not an easy thing to grasp. On the other hand, that is what makes it a really interesting read from a moral perspective. The characters who adhere to the Parents’ side of the conflict don’t often behave in the most altruistic ways. Of course some of the followers of the Twins perform less than pleasant deeds even on their fellow practitioners.
In summation, The Bones of the Earth, although slightly uneven, weighs more on the positive and provides some promise as the finale of the trilogy, The Shattered Sun looms. If Dunne can finish off the trilogy with the same energy and precision with which she began, then the Bound Gods trilogy will indeed be an excellent saga.
© 2018 Rob H. Bedford
June 2017 | Harper Voyager
Trade Paperback | 464 Pages
http://racheldunne.com/
Sample: https://aerbook.com/books/The_Bones_of_the_Earth-28361.html?social=1&retail=1&emailcap=0
Review copy courtesy of the publisher
