Book Review: The Desert Spear

The Desert Spear by Peter V. Brett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Okay, here I go.

I started reading this book immediately after I read The Warded Man because it was teasing me from my shelf for about a month. I picked my copy up at a used book store, intending to read the series, but it took forever to get the first book. I'm glad I read them back to back. It made remembering everything so much easier.

The following contains spoilers. Please read responsibly.

The book opens with a new class of demon. I applaud Brett on this decision. Upping the stakes in a sequel is a good move as long as it makes sense, and this makes perfect sense. Mind controlling demon princes and their shapeshifting pets add the perfect creep factor. I loved it and appropriately weirded out.

New demon aside, Brett went in an entirely different direction with the first part. He rewound the tape, relocated the story to Krasia, and gave us everything about Jardir. You remember Jardir, right? The jerk off that beat up Arlen and took the spear after saying they were friends. As it turns out, he felt horrible for it because of his highly ambitious first wife, Inevera.

Jardir was a poor kid raised to fight the demons as all Krasian boys are. You make it, you're set for life. You fail, you're disgraced into the lower caste like Abban. All Jardir is really good at is war. He's relatively intelligent, but pretty impulsive, which has a tendency to cloud his judgement. Skipping a bunch of character development, grown up Jardir comes across as fervent in the beliefs of his people and his mission, but yet he doesn't seem to quite "get it" when it comes to anything outside of blood or sex.

When the Krasian's invade the north, he blunders horribly by invading Rizon at night where he kills the men that resist and has the women raped. It is needless to say that the northerners don't take too kindly to this. In fact, when Jadir wants to unite them all under him, they're quite upset (understatement) because of his entrance. This pretty much sets the tone for a majority of the book.

This book is all about clashing. There are two "Deliverers" (Arlen and Jardir), two cultures, and the choices the characters must make. Many of them are torn in some sense between direction and another. There is a couple sentences that Jardir says that really sum up the struggles the best: "It seems our cultures are a natural insult to each other.... We must resist the urge to take offense, if we are to learn from each other." (p.167)

My general reaction to Jardir, last book aside, I didn't know whether I wanted him to die stick around so I could laugh at his misfortune in the form of his powerful wife. Brett gives him a bit of the "awkward foreigner" vibe in the scenes when he's in Cutter's Hollow to see the strange northern people who fight the demons. It sounds like a horrible gimmick, but Brett makes it work with his personality. Jardir always tries to understand the strange in his own frame of reference, as all humans do, and Brett understands that well. I applaud him for it.

As for Inevera, I loved to hate her. She's a well rounded, strong female character, but I felt bad for her husband. Bitch is manipulative.

Cutter's Hollow is where the stories join together since Leesha and Rojer are still there perfecting their demon slaying skills. It's been a year, and the only things that have changed is that Leesha is running the village. Rojer still doesn't believe he's important and Leesha has stopped trying to hook up with Arlen since he refuses to let anyone in because he's absorbed too much demon magic and it doesn't burn off in the sun like it's supposed to.

Arlen, now with so much ink it would make a tattoo convention jealous, is trying to share his battle runes with the people until he shows up in the places he was raised. This time around, Arlen's story is more introspective than before. He struggles with the idea that his time left may be limited. I usually don't like mopey characters, but I understood where he was coming from. He screwed up, and he doesn't want anyone to make the same mistake.

Until Renna comes along. There really isn't anything like a spunky, corn-fed girl to make everything better for our sad sack protagonist. She keeps him on his toes. I like her.

The extra view points are nice outside of the previous three. Brett arranges them artfully enough that I didn't feel like I was head hopping.

The previous world building is intact. Since it was so well done before, all he can do is add to it.

Oh, before I forget. One niggle. "... his face was a sandstorm." I rolled my eyes. I really did.

Over all, just as good as the first. Brett handles culture clash well, which only adds to the tension. The new characters are structured well and the character progression for the previous ones is logical. They don't stagnate. Going back to familiar settings is also a good call.

So, I guess I'm going to have to read the next one.

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Book Review: The Warded Man

The Warded Man by Peter V. Brett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I finally managed to track down this book after having a used copy of The Desert Spear staring at me for months. I was thrilled when I could sit down an read it because it had people fighting demons with not an angel in sight. After what I've been reading, hallelujah!

Warning: This review contains spoilers! I only go spoiler free if it's an ARC. Those who read my reviews should know this.

The Warded Man is really the story of three people who have survived a demon attack at some point in their lives. I'm sorry if the following is a large summary. I feel like rambling.

Arlen is a farmer's kid from a backwater town in a world where demons come out to play once the sun goes away. Every day, he checks the wards around their fields and on their walls to make sure they'll be safe come night. Arlen is good with the wards, he's a smart kid, and one day he wants to be a Messenger; a person who braves the night to deliver goods and the mail. When his mother is attacked by a demon and dies, Arlen runs away, ashamed of his father's cowardice. He grows up in the city of Miln in the presence of good people, but runs away just shy of completing his Messenger training because of his fear of being tied down.

Arlen believes man should fight the demons, not hide behind the warded walls like cowards. They should all fight, like the desert dwelling Krasians. (That name is actually quite unfortunate if you say it out loud. It sounds like an Ocean Spray product.) This belief is both his rise and his own personal demon. He stays on the move, not allowing himself to be tied down to anyone. No wife, no children, no friends who see him for more than a few months. He carries news and goods to the five walled cities, and delves into ruins for new wards, hoping to find the lost battle wards. He finds them, carved into a spear, but ends up losing it to his Krasian friend, Jardir. (He's really a character you don't know much about till the second book. And he is quite the character.) Left in the desert for dead, Arlen tattoos runes into his skin so he can fight the demons since he has no other weapons.

Arlen pretty much has a one track mind, and it made me want to thump him a bit. He's all about saving the world, yet continues to isolate himself from others. He remains aloof and distant despite coming across those who are willing to understand: Leesha and Rojer.

Leesha is the second character. She hails from a household with an abusive mother and a meek father in a small town. Demons burn down half the village, and her unfaithful mother has her lover and his son, Leesha's betrothed, stay with them. After her betrothed says they had sex before marriage, she gets pissed at him for her broken reputation. When the old Herb Gatherer - they work like apothecaries - wants Leesha to apprentice, she accepts and ends up being awesome at it. Once she's learned what she can, her master apprentice swaps her for one in the big city because she feels she can't learn anymore.

Leesha is smart and resourceful, but prudish and a bit disillusioned about love and relationships. Even though all the women in her life keep trying to explain to her that sex is just a part of life and it is okay if she wants it, she continues to act high minded about it.

Rojer is the youngest. He was orphaned at three because of the shoddy wards on his parents' inn. Rojer is more a victim of greed and self-service than of demons. The warder was too busy to check the inn because he was trying to gain favor with the duke, and the duke's harold - a jongleur named Arrick - left his parents to die to save his own hide. At least Arrick tries to make up for it by making three fingered Rojer his apprentice. Rojer's special skill is playing the fiddle so good he can hypnotize or drive away demons.

I like Rojer. He's the type of person you can relate to. He's just trying to get by in the world without realizing how good or important he really is. Unlike Arlen or Leesha, Rojer is happy if he can eat and make someone's day. That is why I like him. In simpler words, Arlen and Leesha want to save the world, but Rojer wants to make you smile. He's what the book needs when The Warded Man dips into its more horror aspects.

Most of the book spends time on their three separate stories until the fourth part when they all tie together. Brett keeps it pretty simple with the three point of views, which is a nice change to some high/epic fantasies. (*cough* Martin. *cough*) Since he skips a lot of time, he also conveniently dates the chapters so the reader knows where they're at. Jumping forward also allows him to progress the story without another 50,000 words of useless.

Brett also keeps the language nice and clear, but he is definitely more tell than show. I'm not going to delude myself into believing it's anything super special, but Brett is good writer in the sense that the sentences are structured well and I really enjoyed reading it. In fact, I ran right through the book at full speed. It's the kind of books that a book snob like me and a person who just wants to read because they like fantasy can enjoy.

Although, my sprint was often interrupted by the phrase, "his/her face was a thundercloud." Brett uses a variation of this phrase often, substituting different violent weather patterns to mix things up. Every time I saw this, it saddened me and drove me a bit crazy. This phrase was like ink smears on a white table cloth. No matter what I did to try and forget they were there, I knew, and still cringe every time I come across them.

Oh, and women's fashion. I wasn't sure what he was going for there. He would stick with the generic "skirts" and "dress," which is cool with me, but then sneak "corset" in there, which would be difficult to make with the limited resources of his world considering the boning was usually whale bone (which they don't have with no access to the ocean) or steel (an expensive commodity). Maybe he was going more for stays made of reeds. Oh well. It's obvious I'm over thinking this.

Aside from my personal issues with the book, it still deserves four stars for simple but well done world building, and exciting, easy to understand writing. It keeps pulling you along even though you might occasionally want to throttle Arlen and Leesha. I recommend it for anyone who needs a break to just sit back and enjoy a good fantasy story without needing a genealogy chart or map.

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