author : Jo Walton

This is the story of Sulien ap Gwien, a warrior fighting with High King Urdo to restore Peace to the land of Tir Tanagiri. The first half of the book is about her training, her rise through the ranks, and all the battles, told with a real feel of slogging through cold mud, the hardships of campaign, the grief of losing companions, the logistics of supplying an army, and the fierce joy of battle. The second half, subtitled The King's Law, tells of the even more difficult fights, some physical, some religious, most political, to maintain that hard-won Peace.

Although in one sense this is an alternate history Arthurian story, it is sufficiently alternate that it can be read as straight fantasy. All the names are different (some more different than others), events are different although analogous, even the geography is subtly different, and magic and the Old Gods are real, and play an important part. Occasionally a name is close enough to give you a foreboding if you know the legends, but even if you don't you won't miss much -- the "first person retrospective" style allows the narrator to interject comments like "If I had known what he would do later, I would have killed him then." The main difference is Sulien herself. She's a great character, and the world has been carefully set up so that women can realistically be warriors -- she's not the only one in the story.

This is a good read. There's a rich background (the personnel and all that food for the army don't just pop out of thin air; there are families and farms), lots of distinguishable characters and geography (but I could have done with some family trees, and a map), and absolutely no bloat in the prose (the whole two part book runs to just 400 pages -- lesser authors could easily have written several times that). I'm now off to read the rest of Sulien's story.

• Novacon 30 panel discussion -- What's Hot and What's Not

The Peace has been won, but nothing lasts forever. After five years, several kings decide to revolt, egged on by the scheming Morthu. So Urdo and Sulien have to take up arms again, to maintain the Peace.

This continues the tale in the previous volume (the two books together essentially form a short trilogy, with this being the third book), and maintains the high standard set there. Lots of the foreshadowing seen earlier comes to pass here, and there is a good closure to the story. The large sprawling cast list leaves room for several tragedies, several happy endings, and some justice seen to be done. And there is an amusing Introduction, set several centuries later in the same alternate world, casting some doubts on the authenticity of these "Sulien Texts".

I bought this pair in hardback since it seemed as if they were never going to appear in paperback; I'm not sorry I did.

[p.v] ... a number of the core axioms of the Victorian novel are just wrong. People aren't like that. Women, especially, aren't like that. This novel is the result of wondering what a world would be like if they were, if the axioms of the sentimental Victorian novel were inescapable laws of biology.

Bon Agorin is dying, and his family gathers round for his last hours. He is not rich, and so his unmarried daughters will not have good dowries, and his sons will have to find their own way in the world. What happens next has many of the characteristics a typical Victorian novel, including hissable villains, improbable coincidences, thwarted romances, and satisfying come-uppances --- except for the fact that all the protagonists are dragons. But it's not some trivial substitution: all the background is very richly worked out, including dragon lifecycles, egg laying, flight, and the role of gold. In particular, as noted in the preface quoted above, the female dragons do have many of the qualities of Victorian novel heroines -- which might be slightly grating were it not skillfully countered by their dragonish consumption of great hunks of bloody meat at most meals. Great fun.

What do you do after you have saved the world, a feat that has left you both bereaved and crippled? Especially when you are just a 14 year old girl, and your mother is the mad witch that you have been battling? Well, you run away from home, find your estranged father, end up in a boarding school, try to communicate with the local fairies, and read SF.

On one hand this is a kind of alternative to the great short story "Relentlessly Mundane"; on the other hand it is a coming-of-age autobiography. And on the gripping hand, it is a poem to the genre of Science Fiction. I read it, transfixed. Wow. Most of the time nothing seems to happen. But each small event contributes to Mori's growth, to her moving on, until the ultimate showdown.

This will speak to anyone who grew up supported by reading. Even if they didn't save the world first.