Sat 3 Jun 2006
More Guy Kay books. I have them all, and realized I couldn’t remember much about some of the early ones. That’s actually the reason that I began this blogging effort — I wanted to have some way to remember more about the books that I’ve read, and figured maybe others would find some of my ramblings useful or entertaining.
Despite these efforts, the most popular entry on my blog, according to the search engine stats, is the Sweet Zombie High post. Alas.
This is the last Guy Kay post for a while I think, as its time to move on.
This book is quite similar in tone, style, and structure to the Arbonne book, but this one is set in Moorish Spain. If you’ve read enough of Kay’s books, you will recognize many of the same themes: religiously-inspired war, a love triangle, political intrigue, rather barbaric violence, unrequieted love, the transition from youth to adulthood, self-sacrifice, music, poetry, and more love.
Similar to Arbonne and Last Light of the Sun, the use of magic is kept to a minimum (with a little room for the workings of the Divine), and the story moves based on the actions and choices of the characters. The writing is at times particularly lyrical and beautiful.
I love Kay’s writing, and this is another very fine example. I might read this after Tigana but before Arbonne. Such a feast!