Book Review

[kenjari]

The Swan's War trilogy:
The One Kingdom
The Isle of Battle
The Shadow Roads

by Sean Russell

I was in the mood for an epic fantasy saga, and this series turned out to fit the bill quite well. Sean Russell doesn't have the sheer brilliance of Tad Williams or Lois McMaster Bujold, but he is pretty good. Tis trilogy had many of the typical elements of fantasy: young adventurers from the country, ancient magics, mysterious rogues, heroic nobles, lots of exciting battles, etc. But Russell manages not to use them in entirely predicatble and cliched ways. I also liked the way he sidesteps the "powerful evil being as villain" trope. The real enemy of the tale is a set of intertwined hatreds and feuds (with the accompanying thirst for revenge) that have been carried on too far and for too long, to the point where they no longer have any real purpose or meaning. Russell also does a good job with the characterizations. I greatly liked the way the ending wrapped the story up satisfactorily but still gave me the sense that the characters would continue to have interesting lives after the big adventure was over.

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[destinysfuture.livejournal.com]

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