A gritty fantasy epic from Aurealis Award Nominee Christopher Ruz.As a young mercenary, Richard followed a mysterious Magician on a quest to steal a demon’s treasure and overthrow a king. The two men started their journey as strangers, became lovers along the way, and ended as master and loyal soldier.Twenty years later, that kingdom is steadily falling into ruin and Richard has realized that … and Richard has realized that time and power have twisted the Magician into more monster than man – children disappear nightly into his dungeons and the only things that leave are terrible creatures crafted in the shadows.
To save his own daughter, Richard flees into the wastes where magic boils beneath the sand and monsters walk the dunes in the shape of men. He will return to the burning heart of the desert and restore the demon’s treasure, or die in the trying.
What Richard doesn’t know is that Ana is the key to the Magician’s plans and he and his favorite monster will lay waste to the world to get her back.
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4/5
THE RAGGED BLADE by Christopher Ruz is a dark fantasy novel that covers hundreds of miles of travel across a desert in search of a demon to kill the protagonist’s former lover. If that intrigues you then you should probably pick this one up. The central protagonist is an obsessive antihero willing to kill, maim, lie, cheat, and blaspheme in order to protect his traumatized daughter. It’s not quite grimdark but the main character’s madness makes him darker than your typical protective father.
Richard and his daughter Ana are on the run from the Magician who rules the kingdom they’re fleeing. Richard helped the Magician, his lover, take over and is already a former assassin as well as traitor. He betrayed his king, his kingdom, his god, and comrades in order to place the Magician on the throne. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on who you ask, Richard was changed by fatherhood. Moved by a love for his daughter and guilt regarding his dead wife (Richard is a rare male bisexual protagonist), Richard kidnaps her and steals a sacred jewel that is the source of the Magician’s power.
He then heads across a desert in search of a powerful demon that he believes will help him destroy the Magician. Along the way, he’ll leave a trail of destruction and betrayal in his wake because the Magician is hunting him with his horrific magical construct called “The Culling.” Richard doesn’t care who is caught in the wake, though, because the only thing that matters is the safety of his daughter.
Richard’s obsessiveness is both the strength and weakness of the book. He’s clearly not playing with a full deck and justifies virtually every decision he makes on the basis of whether it will help him get closer to his goal or protect his daughter. Nothing else matters to him and he’s fully willing to abandon entire cities to their destruction if it means success. Flashbacks show that he’s already broken virtually every moral code imaginable so he has very little left to lose.
This makes him a nice contrast to the majority of fantasy heroes who are motivated by morality or naked greed. Unfortunately, it also hurts him because Richard is a bit static as a character. He’s dedicated himself 100% to his goal and his monomania means that he doesn’t really ever change. It also limits his ability to bond with other character since they’re pretty much either friends or foes based on how they impact his quest.
I really enjoyed the side characters of the Kabbah and Priest of the Daughter actually. The Kabbah is a warlord who was living an enjoyable life until Richard effectively doomed him along with everyone he loved for simply passing through. The Priest of the Daughter is a scientist turned holy man who may have seen more hell than heaven. Nevertheless, I actually tend to side with him against Richard when the latter tries to project all manner of atrocities onto him.
I think fantasy readers looking for an epic road trip will be pleased by this book. The world that Christopher Ruz weaves around him is an interesting one that grows more expansive with each location they visit. This is the first book in a series and I should warn readers that it ends on a cliffhanger.