Short Book Reviews: An Unsuccessful Sequel and A Leisurely Paced Fantasy

Goblin King; A Permafrost Novel, by Kara Barbieri (St. Martin’s)

I loved Kara Barbieri’s earlier novel, The White Stag. It introduced me to the world of Permafrost and the character, Janneke, and her moving and ultimately triumphant struggle from near-destruction from unbelievable trauma to healing and, ultimately, understanding and love. Goblin King is a sequel, with the same characters and world. If that’s what a reader is after – spending more time with Janneke, Soren, and the others – they’ll love this.

Much of what made The White Stag so satisfying to me was how complete a journey it made. In an era of series, it shone as a stand-alone. I suspect that its success was what led to this sequel.

Goblin King suffers from the contortions of creating a sequel to a story that was whole in itself, and the result is that it – unlike The White Stag -- descends to the level of the ordinary. The villain we thought dead really isn’t. An existential threat that didn’t exist in the first book suddenly appears. Janneke and her friends wander through one landscape after another, all of which are consistent with the semi-Norse mythological underpinnings of the Permafrost, but none of which were significant before. And in the end, there’s a cliff-hanger promise of a third volume. Added to this were numerous anachronisms – modern idioms and references that seemed jarring in this heavily myth-based world.

I found all of this profoundly unsatisfying. I’m pretty much done with this story line, although I would eagerly pick up a new one by the same author. At the same time, Barbieri is a skillful enough writer to be entertaining no matter what she undertakes. I would have liked to see her use her considerable talents in the creation of a new, complete story. I suspect that is where she will truly excel.

Quantum Shadows, by L. E. Modesitt, Jr. (Tor)

Great premise: In Heaven, an actual place, not the mystical afterlife, the major religions of mankind each have their own land governed by a capital city and ruled by a hegemon. Corvyn, known as the Shadow of the Raven, alone retains the memory of humanity’s Falls from Grace. Falls, as it happened more than once, and now, despite elaborate institutions to preserve harmony and stability, something has gone awry. The symbol of a trident has been found burned into the holy places of the various lands, and Corvyn embarks upon a quest to find out who has defiled these places. And why.

That’s the good part. Also the effortlessly competent prose and descriptive inventiveness. The not-so-good part is that Corvyn’s quest is so leisurely as to approximate sleepwalking, except for the endless (although beautifully described) scenery, inns, meals, wines, and various otherwise-insignificant characters he encounters. Except for a very few high points, the story is utterly lacking in dramatic tension or shape. It’s an enjoyable peregrination, to be sure, one I especially enjoyed relaxing with at bedtime, but I could not help thinking the whole thing could have been cut down to the length of a short story and not an overly bulky novel.