I've finally returned to Mark Chadbourn and his Kingdom of the Serpent trilogy with the middle volume The Burning Man. Or Book 8 in the 9 book cycle, depending on how you want to look at it.
There's quite a bit to unpack here, so bear with me.
We start with the rescue of the folks from the middle trilogy being saved from the grand illusion cast by the void by the heroes of the first trilogy. Which means we have Church, Ruth, Laura and Shavi jailbreaking Mallory, Caitlyn, Hunter, and Sophie. Hal, who is now part of the Blue Fire (or the Pendragon Spirit) is back giving cryptic clues to everyone. Ryan, who impaled himself on Church's magical sword at the end of the last book in this series, comes back to lead the Brothers and Sisters of Spiders, who's ranks include 4 former compatriots of Church during his sojourn in time. Representing the Void again is The Libertarian. And Puck is running around again as well in the background, being suitably inscrutable.
The problem being that since the human characters (other than Church) are slowly recovering memories lost to the illusion of the Void, more and more misunderstandings keep cropping up. This becomes more important as the group splits, with Mallory, Sophie, and Caitlyn going to Far Lands looking for Niamh and the Extinction Shears. Ruth, Church, Laura, and Shavi, in the mean time are off to Norway looking for one of the two keys that can stop the void. Hunter, who decided against joining up with the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons, instead meets a really crotchety Tom the Riddler (to be fair, having reality rearranged to undo your death and rob you of the Odin like power to know every detail of what's coming might make anyone a little cranky), who ends up dragging him back to Church's party. In the Far Lands, Mallory's group runs across Jerzy the minstrel.
Speaking of Odin like powers, early on, Shavi contacts the spirits for information and ends up taking a being's eye to replace his missing one.
Niamh is free from her spider companion when the one group finds her. (She's another who's dealing with the crankiness that comes with having reality rearranged to bring you back from the dead.) Rhiannon and the saved Brothers and Sisters of Dragons are missing.
In Norway, Church's party finds out that the presence of the Brothers and Sisters tends to disturb the Void's illusion, and therefore wakes up the local Great Dominion. In this case, we meet Tyr and Freyja, neither of whom are particularly happy to help or thrilled that Ragnarok is set to begin. Indeed, when Laura picks one of the golden apples, the blood of the Gods starts flowing and causing major issues. In the ensuing chaos, Ryan pops up and kidnaps Ruth as well as grabbing the personification of the first key.
Mallory and party find Rhiannon and free her, but her freedom puts her in a Sleep Like Death, forcing them to seek Math.
Church's party winds up in Egypt. Puck gives Ryan the Anubis Box. Laura nearly gets mummified. We find out the Egyptian Gods have sided with the Void. (Osiris and Anubis are both rather terrifying in this presentation.) Hunter takes Laura to the Far Lands, seeking to heal her in the court of the final Word. Ruth winds up in Greece, where she and a group of abused women end up becoming Maenads under the sights of Dionysus.
Church has a confrontation with the Libertarian, who reveals an interesting secret, if it's true.
Mallory's party meet Ogma, and eventually find the missing Tuatha de Dannan, although conflict arises between Sophie and Caitlyn.
Church's group first winds up in China, then in New York. Along the way, the Blue Fire is awakened at the source again, and we find out what happens when a Wendigo gets loose in Manhattan.
As I stated at the outset, there's a lot to unpack in this, between the Gnostic thought that guides much of the philosophy along with the different faces of syncretic deities. There's also several Burning Men in here, from visions in the Far Lands, to a title Church ends up wearing, and a literal Burning Man in Nevada with Ryan and Ruth at the festival. We also have the whole concept of the serpent equating with wisdom, and therefore the Garden of Eden creation story taking on a whole new slant.
In the end, we have a set up for the final book in the sequence, which will get read eventually, although the amount of foreshadowing in this volume suggests not everyone is going to have a happy ending. On the other hand, I'm curious as to whether or not my current working theory that we're going to wind up in Transcendentalism with everyone belong to the same oversoul holds true. I'm likely wrong, but one of the reveals in here suggests it.
Good read. Was interesting seeing presentations of Pantheons outside of the Celtic.
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