BOOK REVIEW: Bitter Night

Title: Bitter Night (Horngate Witches series, book 1)
Author: Diana Pharaoh Francis

I've seen Diana Pharoah Francis at several sf&f conventions in recent years, and found her a good speaker on panels about the craft and business of writing. While listening to her speak about urban fantasy a few days ago, I decided it was time I read one of her books. During the panel, I logged on to Amazon and downloaded the Kindle edition of Bitter Night.

Although Bitter Night doesn't fit the description of urban fantasy given by one of the other panelists because it lacks a detective element, I would classify it as fitting in the urban fantasy genre. It's set in the present day, but features magic and magical creatures. Francis has designed an interesting magic system for her world. In her setting, powerful witches form covens with less powerful witches and claim territories. Each witch has a cadre of magic-enhanced bodyguards. These bodyguards are divided into two groups: Shadowblades, who are vulnerable to sunlight and can only work at night; and Sunspears, who are vulnerable to darkness and can only serve during the day. Each unit of Shadowblades and Sunspears has one person designated the Prime, who commands the rest of the unit. All of the Shadowblades and Sunspears are magically bonded to their witch by compulsion spells, but they must willingly accept the bond.

The main protagonist of Bitter Night is Max, Shadowblade Prime to a witch named Giselle whose territory is centered in Montana. But unlike most Shadowblades and Sunspears, Max hates her witch and constantly thinks about killing Giselle. It's revealed early in the story that Max believes Giselle tricked her into accepting their magical bond, and consequently she thinks of herself as enslaved to Giselle rather than as the witch's willing servant. It quickly became obvious to me that Max's conviction was completely wrong and her obsession with getting revenge on Giselle was foolish. But of course the character doesn't have the benefit of the reader's perspective.

Max is an unusually powerful and tough Shadowblade, her fierceness and strength fueled by her resentment toward Giselle. Other characters seem able to sense this power in her and are attracted to it. I'm beginning to wonder if Max has some magical talent of her own that will be explored in later books. She's also unwilling to recognize just how devoted her Shadowblades are to her, or how much she means to Giselle. In this she reminds me somewhat of Jim Butcher's urban fantasy hero Harry Dresden, who never realizes just how powerful and frightening he is to other people.

Francis provides a lot of conflict and danger for Max to face. Max's world is about to experience a magical apocalypse. The Guardians, god-like beings to whom the witches owe fealty, have decided that humans have depleted too much of the world's magic and it's time to clean house. Max goes through the tortures of the damned - literally - to protect Horngate and Giselle not only from a rival witch but from the Guardians themselves. There's a lot of exciting cinematic action in the story. Max is like an action movie hero, endlessly suffering injuries that would cripple or kill an ordinary person. At least she has her magical enhancements to explain her ability to withstand horrific wounds and keep fighting.

While overall I enjoyed the novel and read it quickly - always a good sign - there were some elements I found a little disappointing. Max encounters another Shadowblade Prime, Alexander, who instantly finds her attractive. When given the opportunity to leave the witch to whom he's bonded and follow Max, he hardly hesitates. Of course he's an extremely attractive man, which smacked a little too much of a romance novel for my taste. The Guardians also have servants referred to as angels, which when described sound an awful lot like anime characters. The two angels who appear in Bitter Night are both defined as masculine and physically muscular, and they wear the sort of clothes I would expect to see such characters wearing in an anime series. It would have been nice if the angels had seemed less human. But I suppose to a certain extent Francis is playing to an audience that enjoys supernatural romance, so the men have to be attractive even if they aren't human.

Despite the drawbacks I've described, I found Bitter Night an enjoyable read and am looking forward to reading the next novel in the series.

Book Review: Throne of the Crescent Moon

Throne of the Crescent Moon, by Saladin Ahmed

I just finished reading the book, which is a fantasy novel set in a Middle Eastern culture in a locale that sounds very similar to Egypt.  It isn't a long or deep novel, but I enjoyed reading it.  But I couldn't help all the way through feeling a bit like I was reading a roleplaying campaign.  That is not a flaw.

The story follows a small group of characters living in the vast and crowded city of Dhamsawat.  The primary protagonist is Doctor Adoulla Makhslood, an aged ghul hunter who has been at it for decades and is beginning to feel that it is time for him to retire.  He is ably aided in his calling by his assistant Raseed bas Rassed, a Dervish of the Lodge of God.  It wasn't difficult for me to think of D&D character classes that would suit Adoulla and Raseed; Adoulla might be a cleric, or perhaps a wizard, and Raseed could best be described as a lawful good monk with paladin tendencies.  The other characters are a little more difficult to define in D&D-ish terms, but I would probably label Dawoud a sorcerer, Zamia a druid, and Litaz an alchemist (not a stretch, since she's described as such in the story).

Aside from entertaining the gamer in me by evoking such thoughts, the story also entertained by not being set in a medieval Europe analog.  I've read plenty of stories set in places that sound much like Europe or Britain, or occasionally the Roman Empire.  It was nice to read something with a different cultural spin.  Ahmed's writing is full of flavorful phrases that evoke a city of domes and minarets with marketplaces full of exotic spices, silks, gems, and magic talismans that actually work.  Interestingly, there is much reference to religion, a feature often lacking in fantasy unless a character is a priestess or avatar of some deity.  Every character makes reference to the deity of this world on a regular basis.  But despite the clear Arabian Nights feel, this world isn't Islamic, or at least not rigidly Islamic.  There are idols and representational artworks everywhere.

Another feature I enjoyed was the variety of viewpoints used.  Each of the characters I named above serves as viewpoint character at some point in the tale, so the reader gets to know a little about them all.  That style of writing can be frustrating to read if there are too many characters to follow, but here with only five it works nicely. The characters are from two different age groups and several cultural backgrounds, so they provide the reader a window into the world in which Dhamsawat exists, as well as giving different views on the action.

I won't spoil the story by giving any details of the plot.  Suffice to say that Adoulla and his friends must try to save the city from a terrible threat.  They also get embroiled in some political intrigue involving a rebellion against the Khalif, but that is kept to a minimum, which was all right with me as I'm not fond of political intrigue in my fiction reading choices.

On the whole I enjoyed the story a good deal and wouldn't mind if Ahmed decides to write a sequel or another story in the same setting.  If you enjoy fantasy and would like to read something with a different cultural feel, give Throne of the Crescent Moon a read.