MAsquerades, plagues, and kidnapped by pirates!

 I bought Penric's Labors by Lois McMaster Bujold a while back, but it's taken me a while to get to that section of my TBR pile. (Honestly, the last book left on that part of the Pile is Frank Herbert's Dune, and I'm kind of saving that for winter when my annual reading challenge is done, since I know that it's going to be a slog.)

 Anyway, we have three collected Penric novellas here, which, while in series timeline chronological order, kind of fit between other novellas in the series. Indeed, her note at the end discusses how she tends to write out of order, and then kind of affix it to the story timeline later. Which is why our initial offering, Masquerade in Lodi, has Penric unmarried. By the time we hit the last story, The Physicians of Vilnoc, he's married with a daughter. (The middle story, The Orphans of Raspay, he's married with no kids yet.) 

 So, the initial story is set in an analogue of Medievalish Venice. (Maybe a bit closer to the Renaissance?) Penric and Desdemona (his demon) get called out to a hospice to check a rescued drowning man for signs of possession. Turns out, the man is possessed, but how he got there winds up being a whole other mystery, one which Penric and the local Saint of the Bastard have to solve while running around canals at night during a festival not unlike Carnivale.

In the middle story, Penric is sailing back to his home with  an obscure manuscript, gets purloined by pirates and winds up getting held captive with two Quadrene orphans. Which of course leads to nautical fun times.

 And finally, we wind up with a bloodborne plague infecting the local fort, and it falls on Pen and Des to figure out the pathogen and how to stop it.

 As usual, these are entertaining and well written.  

Birdman of Alcatraz

So, the library finally got a physical copy of Lois McMaster Bujold's The Prisoner of Limnos, which continues the story coming out of Penric's Mission, in which Penric is figuring out why he's staying in Orbas, instead of returning home. The answer, of course has to do with lovely Nykis, whom Penric loves, but who remains less than comfortable with the foreign Temple Sorcerer and physician.

However, when word comes to Nykis that her mother is being held prisoner in Cedona, on the Island of Limnos, a convent sacred to the Daughter of Spring. As such, Nykis suckers Penric and Desdemona into breaking her mother out of the place.

Which involves finding Nykis's soon to be Sister-in-Law, befriending her secretary/eunuch, taking said castrato with them to Limnos and breaking out Mom.

Which they do find success in, but it does leave Penric trapped on Limnos temporarily, and the method of escape employed is absolutely breathtaking in its rube Goldberg nature.

I'm very much in love with Penric and Desdemona. I just wish I was more into ebooks to read them quicker.

For Fox Sake

You'll forgive the title of this post.

However, since Lois McMaster Bujold's most recent Penric novella is titled Penric's Fox, it seems rather appropriate.

Anyway, we meet Penric and Desdemona as they fish with the shaman Inglis outside Easthome, the capital of the Weald. A bit of conversation surrounding the way great beasts are raised by the shamans (involving earthworms, which can't be made beasts it turns out) is interrupted by Inspector Oswyl, who has a dead Temple Sorcerer on his hands.

By far the biggest issue (and the reason Penric and Des get dragged in) is the question of where the demon wound up, which ends up being inside a fox vixen who just had a litter. As to the murderer and their motives, that comes about as the narrative unfolds.

Again, I'm loving these small pieces of fiction that Bujold is releasing in her retirement, since I love the setting and I love the characters. That there are paragraphs covering the demon hosting fox and her fluffball pup just makes it even more special.

Down in a hole, losing my soul

I seem to be hitting the greatest hits of the 90's with my titles lately.

Anyrate, as I mentioned, the library actually has hard copies of Lois McMaster Bujold's Penric and Desdemona novels, which lead me to Penric's Mission. Which much like the last volume takes place a bit later in the timeline than the previous volume. As in his previous employer is deceased, and he's now working under a different government official.

So, we join Penric on board a ship pulling into the port city of Patos in Cedonia, on a mission of recruiting a general who's allegedly up for defecting due to dissatisfaction with the Cedonian government. Unfortunately, Penric gets detained and tossed into an oubliette for espionage.

In the mean time, we meet the widow Nykis, who's "twin" brother Adelis (Same father, different mother, both born on the same day. Adelis is the legitimate twin and heir to his father.) happens to be the general Penric seeks. Unfortunately Adelis has also been imprisoned for treason. Nykis tries to help him escape, but he feels that he should be allowed to plea his case and have the Father of Winter show the truth of his claim. The administrator who's arrested both Penric and Adelis disagrees, and has Adelis blinded with boiling vinegar prior to releasing him to his sister's care.

Not long after, they decided to execute Penric by filling his cell with water to drown him. Penric uses his sorcery to condence parts of the water into ice long enough to escape.

Penric and Desdemona track down the siblings and manage to cure Adelis's eyes, which when the government manages to come check on him, leads to a chase across the countryside on horseback. A minor attraction blossoms between Penric and Nykis, although given the novella ends abruptly, I have no idea how that's going to work out.

It's, as always, a good read. Bujold's writing here is one of her best, where one feels a bit like one is savoring a gourmet meal of words served up with savory sauces at a Michelin starred restaurant.I can only hope the next one becomes available soon.

Who knew demons cure lice and fleas?

Recently I found out the lirbary finally got hard copies of Lois McMaster Bujold's Penric novellas, and I was quite ecstatic to be able to read more of the series set in her World of the Five Gods.

So, here we have Penric and the Shaman, in which Penric and his demon, Desdemona, get tapped to go help a Temple Locator to find a rogue shaman suspected of murdering a friend of the shaman. Penric has advanced since the first story, now a Learned in the Bastard's Order. The Father's Locator, Orwyl, doesn't quite know what to make of him, since Penric and Desdemona's conversations tend to be....odd to listen to.

The rogue shaman, Inglis, on the other hand, has run aground in the mountain valleys and damaged his leg. He does find himself among dogs that are on their way to becoming Great Beasts. The shaman who had been breeding the dogs died in a rock slide a few weeks prior.

Eventually, the plots meet up, and we get the full story of why Inglis is bleeding himself and why everyone was called together by the parsimonious Gods.

Given this is a novella, it's a short read, but I love this setting, and I love Ms. Bujold's writing. I also love the reconciliation between the dead mountaineer and his God. May we all be so blessed as to be able to greet divinity with a smile and a sense of humor.

Much love.

Shamantery

So, as I believe I mentioned previously, I've been reading through some books I've picked up at various book sales of late while waiting on reserves to show up at the library. I'm happy to report one of them came in and was picked up today, so I'll be reviewing new fiction pretty soon. In the mean time, let me tell you of the kind of adrift in the overall timeline of Lois McMaster Bujold's World of Five Gods series, The Hallowed Hunt.  (I say adrift because goodreads lists it as book 1 in the series, even though it was written long after the first 2.)


While the two books written before this take place in and around Chalion, This one takes place in what seems to be south of Darcatha in an area once known as the Weald. (They got conquered by Darcatha before this book starts, but it appears they've regained some autonomy since Aurak destroyed the old king. The retain the Quintarian Orthodoxy that Darcatha instilled, meaning that those with Weald era issues like having an animal spirit grafted onto their souls are considered as bad as Demon ridden sorcerers.)

Thankfully, Ingrey kin Wolfcliff has a dispensation from the temple that keeps him from being burned at the stake to rid him of his affliction, namely having a wolf soul grafted on to his by his father. Which is good, since we meet him en route to a former prince's home in exile, where the Prince is dead and the murderer is a young Chalionese woman the Prince was trying to kill in process of adding a leopard spirit to his soul. Somehow, Ijada got the leopard and managed to bludgeon her attacker to death.

Which, in the Weald's political climate makes her more apt to be burned at the stake or hanged for murder than vindicated with a finding of self defense. However, since everyone must ride back to the capital with the prince's body, this gives us time to get a better view of what it means to be a shaman. Particularly when Ingrey's wolf starts coming to the fore and trying to kill Ijada. Thankfully, Learned Hallana (a divine of both the Mother and a Sorcerer in the Bastard's Order thanks to a quirk of fate), arrives at one of the stops on the procession and finds that a geas has been placed on Ingrey. She manages to remove it, but in the process, it brings the Wolf out of the containment Ingrey had built for it. The Divine sends a letter with Ingrey to take with him to another Divine in the Capital to see what can be done.

While this meeting does eventually happen, it's not before we meet another exceptionally memorable minor character in the book, Prince Jokol Skullsplitter, who got his surname from the skullspilitting headaches his poetry gives his crew. Jokol is from islands away from the Weald, and in town to drop off an Ice Bear named Fafa to the Bastard's Order in exchange for a Divine for his island.

While Hallana and Jokol provide some much needed comic relief throughout the book, much of the actual plot centers on Wencel kin Horseriver, Ingrey's cousin. Wencel, it seems, has a horse of his own. And quite a bit more besides.

It's actually quite breathtaking in its plot, once it gets going. We have a conflict between what a man wants and what the Gods want, although the Gods are limited by what their vessels can be inspired and willing to do on their behalf.

When I read this the last time, it was right after I managed to sprain/break by elbow, so my perceptions were likely off with the presence of painkillers. However, a new reread does suggest that while the book takes some time getting going (it's roughly one third of the book before some of the bigger plot points start coming in to play), the overall book remains a fantastic read.

Inventive invectives.

So, the past few days, I've been slowly devouring the second book (in order of the way they were written) of Lois McMaster Bujold's World of the Five Gods, Paladin of Souls.

Much like the first book, it's a rich feast, although less broad in its scope than its predecessor.

We open following the funeral of the old Provincara, who's firm grip has kept Valenda running through the years. Her daughter, the Dowager Royina Ista, long thought mad, is annoyed to be cooped up in her mother's house, expected to either take her mother's seat or worse be kept away from society as the presumed mad woman everyone thought she was. (Following the lifting of the curse in the last book, Ista's back to semi-normal.)

A chance meeting with a pilgrimage passing through Valenda inspires Ista with the idea of escaping her hereditary prison, a small pilgrimage of her own, under the pretense of praying for her daughter, the Royesse Iselle and her Royce-Consort Bergon to have a son. After imploring Chancellor Cazaril, the Dy Gurda brothers, Foix and Ferda ride down with a small company to accompany the pilgrimage, and a last minute substitution leads to Learned dy Cabon, a priest of the Bastard, to be the spiritual conductor of the event, much to the wailing and gnashing of teeth by those who love Ista and wish to show that love by confining her.

The pilgrimage proceeds fairly normally at first, with Ista riding under an assumed name and a courier named Liss roped into playing Lady-in-Waiting. We meet much of the accompanying party, and like Ista begin to know and love them. Problems begin to arise when a demon possessed bear attacks Ista on the road, only to be slain by Foix. As demons in this setting are prone to doing, the demon hitches a ride with Foix. Not long after, the party runs afoul of a Roknari raiding party out of Jokona. By now Ista has dreamed of a man, while Learned dy Cabon has dreamed of his death in just such an event.

With a bunch of moving around, Ista gets captured while most of the party escapes. Ista does get rescued a province north of where she was captured by Lord Arhys, who's castle, Porifors guards the pass into enemy Jokona.

Problem of course being that things at Porifors aren't exactly as cut and dried as the seem, what with Arhys's demon possessed bride Cattilara, his seemingly ill bastard half-brother Illvin appearing in Ista's dreams, and as we find later on, a dead lord reanimated by one very annoyed demon who wasn't expecting his wife to be quite as strong willed, given that Cattilara is first described by her brother-in-law as the type you could put a candle by one ear and blow it out thorough the other. (That's a paraphrase, and close enough to the original quote.)

Quite a puzzle to unravel, particularly when The Bastard entices Ista into taking on some of his gifts, like second sight. The complex mess gets more interesting as members of the original party return, and Prince Sordso of Jokona shows up with his Regent mother, Joen. Which is about the time we start figuring out how all of this ties in with the fist book, and eventually some very well written moments as the knot becomes untangled.


There are a few passages of breathtaking beauty in these pages, not the least of which involves finding a way to get Arhys free of his theological damnation/sundering, or when Ista finally forgives herself, her husband, and his lover (the lover who also happens to be Arhys's father) for what happened prior to the first book.

To be sure, this is another one I'd recommend to folks, but only after they read The Curse of Chalion.

Savage curses are occasionally answered prayers

Well, given I'm waiting for holds to show up at the library, this has required delving into my bookshelf for more books again.

In this case, I dug out one of my favorite books, Lois McMaster Bujold's The Curse of Chalion. 

As a bit of backstory, I went to an author's signing of this particular volume back in 2000ish thanks to a coworker mentioning it in passing. While I mainly went to get my copy of Ethan of Athos signed, she talked of her mindset while writing Chalion, and eventually, I think I ripped off the Science Fiction Book Club to get a copy.

Chalion as the book opens, is a landlocked kingdom sandwiched between the archipelago of the Roknari; Brajar and Ibra on coasts; with vast Darcatha to the South. As we get bits of the history, we find that the Roknari had long ago conquered the lands, savaging everything as they came south. Eventually, the peoples fought back, driving the Roknari north to the 5 Princedoms of the archipelago. Prior to the start of this story, the Lion of the Roknari, the Golden General managed to unite the princedoms into one nation and began to take back the land. Fonsa the Wise (Roya of Chalion), eventually performed Death Magic to take out the General, killing Fonsa and the General. Thus why Fonsa became posthumously known as Fonsa the Fairly Wise.

As the book opens, we meet Cazaril (which technically is his last name, his full name and title is Castillar Lupe dy Cazaril), who has spent weeks walking from the Ibran coast to Valenda, a town in the Chalionese province of Baocia. Cazaril, nearly broken from years on a Roknari slave galley, seeks work with the Provincara, whom he knew in his youth working as her husband's page. The Provincara is not alone in her home, as her daughter, the former Royina Ista is there, lost in seeming madness, along with the Royesse and Royce of Chalion, Iselle and Teidez.

 Through happenstance, Cazaril ends up becoming Iselle's Secretary-Tutor, along with her courtier, Betriz. Iselle is the more level headed of Ista's children, with Teidez being an adolescent boy more interested in hunting than statecraft.

Eventually, the current Roya of Chalion, Ista's stepson Orico, summons the siblings and their entourages to the Zangre castle in the capitol city of Cardegoss. It's here we meet the brothers dy Jironal, Martou and Dondo. Martou, currently Orico's Chancellor, was directly responsible for Cazaril's sale to the Roknari slavers following the siege of Gotorget, albeit at his brother's urging.

Much politicing ensues, and eventually, Dondo ends up engaged to marry Iselle, a situation not much loved by anyone other than Dondo. Which is when Caz attempts Death Magic on Dondo. And survives, even as Dondo doesn't. Which is how we find out Caz is now Gods touched, and we find out what the curse in the title refers to, as all of Fonsa's line share the curse brought on by the Golden General's death.

The ride to the end is glorious.

This is one of the few books that I recommend to almost everyone I know. It's that good.

(Side note: I know goodreads lists this as book 2 in the series, with High Hunt listed as book 1 and the Penric novellas as 1.5 and 1.6, but Chalion and its sequel, Paladin of Souls were written first. And honestly, Chalion will give readers a much better grounding in the World of the Five Gods than any of the other volumes, even if they can be read in series chronological order.)

Well, that was fast

I called in sick today, and in between passing out in bed, I managed to finish Lois McMaster Bujold's novella, Penric's Demon, set in the World of the Five Gods. I sadly haven't re-read the three novels that precede this particular tale since I started this blog, but that may change before too terribly long, particularly if I can procure a copy of the follow up to this volume, Penric and the Shaman.

A bit of summation of the setting, since a new reader to the world could theoretically pick up on some of it, but it would miss the rich tapestry of the world. Basically, Most of the nations in this setting recognize Five Gods, The Daughter of Spring, The Mother of Summer, The Son of Autumn, The Father of Winter, and the Bastard, God of all things out of season. In the archipelago of Roknari, they consider the Bastard a demon and not a God, leading to what most characters think of as the Quadrene Heresy. It also means things The Bastard rules are outlawed behaviors in the archipelago.

The previous three volumues in the series focused on the ways the gods work in the setting, as well as introducing Shamanism in cold Darcatha. Shamanism in this world merges the soul of a human with that of an animal, and must be undone for one of the 5 to claim the soul.

Anyway, this one is set in what seems to be the small kingdom of the Weald and literally starts about the place most books would place chapter 5 or 6. Poor Lord Penric (literally poor as his Barony of Jurold was left mostly bankrupt by Penric's father) is on the way to his arranged marriage with a nobleman's daughter when he stops to assist Learned Ruchia, a sorcerer of the Bastard who had the misfortune to have a heart attack in front of Penric's horse. (Temple sorcerers are those who are possessed by a demon, but have equal or greater footing in the arrangement than the demon.)

As such, as Ruchia dies, the demon she's hosting jumps into Penric, who's not been properly prepared for such a thing. Nor, when the demon starts talking, is he prepared for a demon whose personalities are all female. (Demons take on the traits of the people they've possessed. As such, this one has Ruchia and several predecessors including a courtesan, a lioness and a doe incorporated into the whole.) This leads to some rather amusing situations, as Penric is an adolescent, and also doesn't quite understand a certain bathhouse when he makes it to Martensbridge, where Learned Ruchia was originally traveling.

As such, we watch as he slowly becomes an accidental sorcerer, naming the demon Desdemona, as well as acknowledging her 12 other parts. We read, intrigued, as he gets pulled into small amounts of spy craft and trapped by one who would be a friend.

And in the end, we find him pleading with The Bastard for the life of Desdemona.

I love this setting immensely, and would highly recommend it (starting with The Curse of Chalion) to anyone who enjoys intelligent, well written fantasy that understands pacing.