Son of Avonar by Carol Berg

[meganbmoore]

Fourteen years ago Serianna, younger sister to the King's Champion, Tomas, was supposed to marry the newly crowned King Evard.  Instead, she married Karon, a humble antiquities dealer.  Except that Karon was secretly a survivor of Avonar, a land whose people were all but exterminated for sorcery.  In Leire, sorcerers are regarded as devils, and were Karon's ability to heal ever discovered, he would, at the least, be executed.  Several years later, Tomas and his lieutenant, Darzid, discover Karon's nature and reveal him to the king, with Tomas using his influence to protect Seri, believing that she had been controlled by Karon.  After months of torture, Karon is executed as a sorcerer, and when Seri gives birth to their son shortly after, he, too, is killed.

With nothing left but her hatred, Seri flees her brother and lives as a peasant, refusing the shelter he offers, returning to the capital only once a year under the eye of Rowan Graeme, the local sheriff, to pay her "penance" to the king.  Ten years later, she encounters a mad, violent, amnesiac young man in the woods near her home.  When she learns that he's being hunted by Darzid, she gives him shelter out of spite, naming him Aeren.  Soon, a man of Karon's people learns of Aeren and tells her that Aeren is actually D'Nathiel, a prince, and one who must travel to the bridge of D'Arnath, a word Karon shouted into her mind as he died.  Seri wants nothing to do with either man, but can't let the connection to Karon slide.

A lot of the plot of fairly basic fantasy, but handled in an interesting way.  Many things(especially the characters of Tomas and Rowan Graeme, as well as D'Nathiel) are presented one way as certain fantasy stereotypes, then slowly revealed to be something else, and many of the characterizations are a step up from your average fantasy.  There are also a decent number of twists and mysteries, some predictable, and some not.  For example, I figured out the Big Reveal about D'Nathiel(not, not the prince thing, we learn that almost right away) about midway through, but I didn't figure out how.

The only problem is that the writing style is kind of...random.  The actual voice is solid, but early parts of the book are filled with random info dumps, sometimes with leadins, sometimes without, and sometimes inside of flashbacks.  In addition, the first half of the book is split between flashbacks and the main story.  This would be fine, except that for a long time, the flashbacks seem to skip all over the place, covering from soon after Seri first met Karon until the early months of her life as a peasant, until finally settling into a linear accounting of Karon's "trial" and torture.  That said, I don't think this complicated(sometimes overcomplicated, it seemed) style would bother me, except that Trudi Canavan's style was very straightforward and matter-of-fact, and very easy to read, so Berg'sstood out even more as a follow-up.

So, short version:  Not the best or most original fantasy ever, but good and with a number of interesting aspects, and I very much like the "ending" that Seri and D'Nathiel, as well as Rowan Graeme and the young healer, Kellea, eventually get.  (It's a temporary ending, as there are three more books in the series, but it's good for now.)

Comments

[fire-snake.livejournal.com]

I remember flipping through it in the bookstore. I don't remember what struck me wrong, either the writing style or the gratuitous violence of having the main female character's whole family killed, or it being a tale of revenge. For some reason, this kind of books doesn't sit well with me. I didn't even like "Count Monte Cristo" as a child. I think I just don't like cold and disillusioned characters in the center or narration, no matter what happened to them and theirs.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

The revenge isn't really a major theme. She has a lot of understandable hatred, but a major theme of the book is her realizing that she's let that blind her, and getting past it. The revenge only really plays in when she gives D'Nathiel shelter after learning Darzid is helping him. After that, she just wanted to send D'Nathiel on his way, until she learned there was a connection with her husband. The fate of Seri's family was gruesome but, sadly, fitting with some historical attitudes, and could have been a lot more so.

It has it's share of flaws, but I think it did a good job in dealing with the revenge/disillusioned theme, especially as a lot of it was looking past that.