The movement of the sun and moon often hold portentous signs, sometimes in history, and especially in mythology-infused fiction. In Black Sun, the first installment of Rebecca Roanhorse’s Between Earth and Sky saga, a solar eclipse will be occurring during the commencing of the Winter Solstice. Told through three primary points of view, Serapio, a young blind man who might be on his way to becoming a god who requires passage to the City of Tova; Xiala, the woman who helps to provide his passage; and Naranpa, a priest of the City of Tova, Roanhorse’s novel takes inspiration from pre-Columbian America and elevates the Epic Fantasy genre to unique heights.
A god will return
When the earth and sky converge
Under the black sun
In the holy city of Tova, the winter solstice is usually a time for celebration and renewal, but this year it coincides with a solar eclipse, a rare celestial event proscribed by the Sun Priest as an unbalancing of the world.
Meanwhile, a ship launches from a distant city bound for Tova and set to arrive on the solstice. The captain of the ship, Xiala, is a disgraced Teek whose song can calm the waters around her as easily as it can warp a man’s mind. Her ship carries one passenger. Described as harmless, the passenger, Serapio, is a young man, blind, scarred, and cloaked in destiny. As Xiala well knows, when a man is described as harmless, he usually ends up being a villain.
Crafted with unforgettable characters, Rebecca Roanhorse has created an epic adventure exploring the decadence of power amidst the weight of history and the struggle of individuals swimming against the confines of society and their broken pasts in the most original series debut of the decade.
When the opening line of a novel is “Today he would become a god,” you know you are in store for something epic. This young man, Serapio, is blinded by his mother, which she tells him will set him on a path of a powerful destiny. This happens in the first few pages of the novel, which sets both the epic stakes of the novel as well as the uncompromising harsh tone of the novel. The second chapter introduces readers to Xiala, the Teek (a race whose true nature is hinted at early, but only fully revealed more than halfway through the novel) captain a somewhat blacklisted seafarer who is struggling to keep her regain a measure of respect. In the third chapter, Roanhorse again switches viewpoint characters to Naranpa, a young female who is the newly appointed Sun Priest of the Order of Oracles, of the Watchers in the city of Tova.
These three character’s storylines are told in interweaving narratives throughout the novel. While much of the time Xiala and Serapio are together we get the story from Xiala’s perspective, Roanhoarse turns the clock/calendar back a few years to focus on Serapio’s life from the time he is blinded by his mother through his “education” of becoming the vessel of a god so the reader can gain some measure of Serapio’s perspective. The way in which Serapio’s “past” storyline catches up with the “current” action of the novel, especially as the high stakes of his journey with Xiala and the portentous events in Tova unfold, is a masterful balancing of tension and storytelling on Roanhorse’s part. If it isn’t perfect, then it is a very near thing.
As for the city of Tova itself, political machinations abound as Naranapa is settling into her role of Sun Priest. To say that some of the political powers in Tova aren’t thrilled that she is the new priest is an understatement, her familial origins aren’t exactly held in high regard. Coupling that political tension with the Convergence of the Winter Solstice and the Eclipse holds resonance with that opening line of the novel.
The main action and narrative pull of the novel kicks into high gear fairly early when Xiala is hired (after being jailed for essentially public drunkenness) by a nobleman to captain a ship with one very important “piece of cargo” from her home port to Cuecola to Tova. Roanhorse’s plotting, deft hand at characterization, and pace at revealing details about the world and characters, makes Black Sun an un-put-downable novel.
Much of the character beats and the overall structure of the story is fairly familiar – an outcast as one character while another character is a youth ascending to their destiny, set against a backdrop of prophecy, magic, not-so-human characters, strange creatures like large, magical crows. Roanhorse does all of that stuff, the tropes, the characterization extremely well. What helps to elevate the novel (and the series), is the setting and cultures/mythologies that flavor the world. Echoes of North American mythology like Mayan civilization are imbued throughout.
I would be remiss if I did not remark on the physical book itself, quite simply, it is gorgeous. There is a lush, gorgeous, evocative cover from John Picacio and the maps (front and back are different) on the endpapers are lovely. There’s also a character list at the front, delineate from which nations/regions each character originates. What does all of this say to me? The people making this book have a love for Epic Fantasy and have their finger on the pulse of what many readers of Epic Fantasy expect in the physical book of an Epic Fantasy novel.
Black Sun is an outstanding novelistic achievement – expertly drawn characters, fascinating and refreshing worldbuilding, and potent and magnetic narrative/plotting, make this a contender for best fantasy novel of the year. Roanhorse has outdone herself in this novel (and her two Sixth World novels are pretty damned good!).
Highly Recommended
© 2020 Rob H. Bedford
Between Earth and Sky Book 1
Hardcover | October 2020 | 454 Pages
Published by Saga Press
Publisher Page: https://simonandschusterpublishing.com/black-sun/
https://rebeccaroanhorse.com/
Review Copy courtesy of the publisher
