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Book Review: The Privilege of the Sword, Ellen Kushner
This is the book I have been waiting for since I first read Swordspoint, more than ten years ago.
It's not the first sequel. When The Fall of the Kings came out, a few years back, I devoured that too. And I was delighted to find old familiar names, and see how the City had changed, and I learned fascinating things about its history, and gnawed my knuckles in sheer envy over the complicated silver chocolate services... but I wasn't quite satisfied, because it had skipped a generation ahead, and it didn't really tell me what I most wanted to know, which was "what became of Richard and Alec?"
This one does.
This is a jewel of a book. At first I thought of it as a tray of pastries, each more cunning and delicious than the last -- creamy eclairs, jam tarts, marzipan fruits with their hint of cyanide bitterness under the sweet -- with all of the gowns and matchmaking and Riverside debauchery and multi-era historical details, with all of the froth of the best Georgette Heyer novels, concentrated and multiplied -- and then, as I read further on, it was as if I found another platter of savory morsels hiding behind it, because Ellen Kushner doesn't stop at the glorious surface froth. She's spent a great deal of time considering how the sordid, dreary, and messy complications we're used to in modern life would play out in the setting and the culture she's developed. It gives everything depth, and richness, and a startling reality.
If you've ever wondered what became of any of the characters from Swordspoint, you'll find it out in this book. Well, I didn't notice Nimble Willie the pickpocket, I suppose, but otherwise, they're all there. And you learn what drove Alec to live as he did, and... oh, there is SO MUCH in this book.
Also, if you are like me, you will be utterly slain by the recurrence of this line: "'Hello,' he said. 'I've brought us some fish.'"
Read it. Buy it. Buy it for all your friends, but make them read Swordspoint first.
Absolutely worth the wait.
It's not the first sequel. When The Fall of the Kings came out, a few years back, I devoured that too. And I was delighted to find old familiar names, and see how the City had changed, and I learned fascinating things about its history, and gnawed my knuckles in sheer envy over the complicated silver chocolate services... but I wasn't quite satisfied, because it had skipped a generation ahead, and it didn't really tell me what I most wanted to know, which was "what became of Richard and Alec?"
This one does.
This is a jewel of a book. At first I thought of it as a tray of pastries, each more cunning and delicious than the last -- creamy eclairs, jam tarts, marzipan fruits with their hint of cyanide bitterness under the sweet -- with all of the gowns and matchmaking and Riverside debauchery and multi-era historical details, with all of the froth of the best Georgette Heyer novels, concentrated and multiplied -- and then, as I read further on, it was as if I found another platter of savory morsels hiding behind it, because Ellen Kushner doesn't stop at the glorious surface froth. She's spent a great deal of time considering how the sordid, dreary, and messy complications we're used to in modern life would play out in the setting and the culture she's developed. It gives everything depth, and richness, and a startling reality.
If you've ever wondered what became of any of the characters from Swordspoint, you'll find it out in this book. Well, I didn't notice Nimble Willie the pickpocket, I suppose, but otherwise, they're all there. And you learn what drove Alec to live as he did, and... oh, there is SO MUCH in this book.
Also, if you are like me, you will be utterly slain by the recurrence of this line: "'Hello,' he said. 'I've brought us some fish.'"
Read it. Buy it. Buy it for all your friends, but make them read Swordspoint first.
Absolutely worth the wait.
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--Kris