liadnan

Jacqueline Carey, Kushiel's Dart
Hmm. First things first, this novel is not for everyone. Our Heroine is, essentially, a prostitute specialising in BDSM and some may find the descriptions of her working life a bit much. Not that they are graphic, or that they dominate the story (this is not a piece of thinly disguised, much less undisguised, erotica), but fair warning, as tastes vary.

If that is a problem, then it's a shame because this is a very good fantasy novel. The blurb describes the world as renaissance inspired, but that, I would say, is rubbish: it's 12th-13th century southern France, in many ways, the time of the troubadours (G.G.Kay's Song for Arbonne is another go at this) though having said that the poets and troubadours, although important in the society and indeed to the plot of the novel, are not particularly evident, the emphasis is much more on the semi-religious prostitutes. Carey has invented a startling heresy (the myth of the founder of the religion is basically that he was born of Christ's dying ejaculation and thus union with mother earth as he hung on the cross, though she puts it rather more elegantly) and has put this heresy in the place of Catharism, only without that religion's major problem of being the subject of a crusade. Rather ironically so as the heresy she has invented is at the opposite pole of belief from Catharism, embracing this world and sex in particular, rather than rejecting it...

It's a long book, full of political machinations and odd characters but, blissfully, very, very little in the way of magic. In the short part when that does appear it has a mythic and poorly understood quality, as opposed to the well-trodden road of so much fantasy where magic is common, but no one ever stops to think about what this might do to the economy, for instance. Oh, and a gypsy who can see the future, but that too is a surprisingly uncommon trope. Worth a go unless you have problems with the occasional graphic but oh so elegantly described sex scenes and a truly fascinating, if bizarre, heresy.

Odd side note: I avoided this for the ages because Robert Jordan rated it on the blurb. Publishers might want to start considering whether endorsements from some writers are a two edged sword. Carey has very good ideas, like Jordan; unlike him she also appears to have a competent editor and to be able to write decent prose.