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Fantasy. Fiction. "Immensely appealing, intelligent, and great fun.". "Embraces the age-old struggle between scholars and mystics...to bridge the gulf that separates history from mystery.". "One of the bawdiest and most intellectually stimulating novels of the year!". "Richly textured...authentic...A fantasy novel that won't insult your intelligence.". "Gorgeous prose and a galloping story, with...a deep understanding of a true scholar's passion for his subject.". HTML:"Stunning...If Oscar Wilde were writing high fantasy, he'd want to write The Fall of the Kings.". "Attractive characters, realistically enmeshed in social, political, and personal concerns... realized with a robust depth and realism.". "Kushner and Sherman don't spin fables or knit fancies: they are world-forgers, working in a language of iron and air.". HTML:"The Fall of the Kings is, if possible, even better [than Swordspoint]--twistier and deeper.". "Splendid....one of my favorite books this year!". "This is how fantasy should be written!...sweeps you in and lets you live the story with the characters.". "A delicious read . . . dark, sexy, and wickedly funny by turns. I loved it. You'll love it too.". HTML: This stunning follow-up to Ellen Kushner's cult-classic novel, Swordspoint, is set in the same world of labyrinthine intrigue, where sharp swords and even sharper wits rule. Against a rich tapestry of artists and aristocrats, students, strumpets, and spies, a gentleman and a scholar will find themselves playing out an ancient drama destined to explode their society's smug view of itself--and reveal that sometimes the best price of uncovering history is being forced to repeat it.... The Fall of the Kings Generations ago the last king fell, taking with him the final truths about a race of wizards who ruled at his side. But the blood of the kings runs deep in the land and its people, waiting for the coming together of two unusual men, Theron Campion, a young nobleman of royal lineage, is heir to an ancient house and a modern scandal. Tormented by his twin duties to his family and his own bright spirit, he seeks solace in the University. There he meets Basil St. Cloud, a brilliant and charismatic teacher ruled by a passion for knowledge--and a passion for the ancient kings. Of course, everyone now knows that the wizards were charlatans and the kings their dupes and puppets. Only Basil ins not convinced--nor is he convinced that the city has seen its last king... From the Trade Paperback edition..… (more)
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This was an absolutely amazing book; it affected me so much that I've had difficulty putting my feelings into words. For most of the book, I was intensely
And yet, I wasn't entirely sure why I was so wrapped up in the story. If I thought of any one person or event as separate from the narrative as a whole, it (or he or she) didn't affect me very much. I really think the book's impact depends on the big picture. The layering is key; each element is so beautifully placed alongside everything else that no one area of the book is isolated. Everything that happens impacts on everything else; the whole world is rich and complex and interconnected.
And within this rich, complex world, there's some great stuff going on. I particularly enjoyed the scholarship; as someone who's spent many years now in a university setting, I found many of the scenes recognizable and easy to relate to. They got me thinking about my own connections to scholarship, and I came to some interesting personal conclusions as a result. I also appreciated how Kushner and Sherman worked through issues of family and social responsibility.
The book does have some pitfalls, though. I felt my connection waver somewhat once the magic was in full swing; some portions of the narrative became distanced and dreamlike. In some ways, this was a welcome break, (as I mentioned, things are pretty intense earlier on), but I think it lessened the climax's impact.
There were also a few areas where I felt like I was missing some key information. Enough was included that I could still follow along, but I almost wonder if I shouldn't have read The Privilege of the Sword first. (I elected to wait until after I'd read this one, as The Fall of the Kings was published first).
Overall, though, this was a fantastic read. It far outstripped my (rather high) expectations. Highly recommended.
Review: Oooh, this was really good. I'm not going to say that it's better or worse than Kushner's other Riverside books; it is quite different. It takes place thirty to forty years after The Privilege of the Sword - Katherine is now Duchess Tremontaine and in her 50s. The city is recognizably the same - Theron lives with his mother in his father's Riverside House - but dueling has more or less fallen out of fashion, and this novel focuses on a part of the city we haven't seen much of before: namely, the University. This book also has a broader worldbuilding scope than the previous two: we learn more about the rest of the country (other than being "that place where nobles go for the summer"), and about its history. This book is also quite different from the previous two in terms of approach to the genre. While Swordspoint and The Privilege of the Sword were fantasy only inasmuch as they did not take place in a real historical world and time, The Fall of the Kings is much more decidedly fantasy - there is a fair bit of magic, although it's largely mysticism blending into magic, replacing the swordsplay and some of the political machinations of the first two.
As much as I did enjoy this book - and I did, for reasons I'll get to in a minute - it did take me a while to get into and read. Part of this may have been the sudden uptick in historical worldbuilding; some amount of infodumping is unavoidable when one of your main characters is a history professor, I suspect. It wasn't uninteresting by any means, but it also didn't suck me in right off the bat, either. I also didn't really feel a strong connection to either Basil or Theron right away. They both have strong shells up to start with, for legitimate reasons, but it almost felt as though they were keeping the reader at a distance along with everyone else. As the story went on, those defenses started to come down, and I got more and more involved with the characters (although I don't know that I ever loved them as much as I did Alec and Richard) and more involved with the story, but it was a bit of a slow build for me.
But it turns out that I didn't mind, because "build" is exactly what this story does, and does so very well. Kushner and Sherman co-opt a lot of Celtic/Druidic imagery, of the oak grove and the horned king and the sacrifice to the land. But it almost didn't feel like borrowing, because this story imbues that imagery with so much power, such a strong feeling of portent and magic and significance. And even though it's clear fairly early on what everything is building up to, all of the story elements have so much resonance that watching each one slot into place and build up to the conclusion that you know is coming still manages to be almost breathtakingly tense. It's the kind of book whose power of imagery and illusion is so strong, so real, and so resonant that you can feel it in your chest. 4 out of 5 stars.
Recommendation: Because this book involves the next generation, it would be just fine as a standalone. Recommended for people who like stories of the past impinging on the present, and books with scenes and images that will linger in your head long after you've finished them.
The hitch is that the Land (in a mystic sense) needs a king again to flourish. Besides the relationship between the two men, politics, and classism, there is a lot of scholarly debate about the meaning and purpose of learning as well as the proper methodology. I found it all very entertaining. The ending was somewhat tragic, but very realistic and I found the last lines very positive and uplifting. It was a grand story. I highly recommend it.
The Privilege of the Sword is my favorite of these three books, Fall of Kings is either tied or slightly less good than Swordspoint.
'Fall' , however, didn't capture me and draw me in to the story. It felt as though, in spite of impending crises in their respective lives, the two main characters were always jumping into bed together in every chapter, or, if not, making excuses to meet so they could jump into bed ... Although I understand (and understood while reading) that it was part of the plot (but not essential, I felt), quite so much of it got a bit tiresome for me, and interrupted the flow of the story.
Torrid affair aside, the story is told from the viewpoint of a few different characters about how the legends of ancient kings and wizards, which have been suppressed by history, affect various factions in contemporary times. The scholars of the University are keen to unearth the truth, Northerners want to reinstate the long-deposed kings and ceremonies, politicians want to leave things buried and noblemen and women somehow get caught in the middle. The plot, when it came together at the end, didn't have (for me, at least) the blinding revelation it kept promising, and left questions unanswered.
Set in the world of Ellen Kushner's Swordspoint and The Privilege of the Sword, it's about forty or fifty years after Privilege. Katherine is Duchess Tremontaine, and Theron, Alec's posthumous son from his very late marriage to
He's also young, romantic, a poet, and an eternal student, flitting from one field of study to another, currently studying rhetoric. His heart broken (most recently) by the artist Isolde, who painted him for a year and then was done with him, he meets the dynamic young magister, Doctor of History Basil St. Cloud.
St. Cloud doesn't know this about himself yet, but he's a budding radical, a specialist in ancient history who is starting to go back to primary sources, and beginning to suspect that the despised wizards that the equally despised "mad" ancient kings brought south with them were not all charlatans and frauds.
When St. Cloud, trouble-making scholar, and Theron Campion, descendant of Duke David, the killer of the last king, but also of that last king's sister, fall in love, they set in motion political and emotional upheaval that will rock the city.
We see parts of city life absent from the earlier novels, and an exploration of why, until now, these have been fantasy novels without magic. We finally get some sense of the larger kingdom, and how it works for those who are neither the privileged class nor the Riversiders.
The performance is in every way excellent. The voices are well matched to their characters, with sound effects and transitional music that enhance the sense of being drawn into the world of the story.
Highly recommended.
I bought this book.
It's sixty years later, and Alec Campion, now remembered as the Mad Duke, has been dead for twenty years. Before he died, though, he brought back from his travels a wife, Sophia, who gave birth to a son a few months after the Mad Duke's death. That posthumous son, Theron, is heir to his cousin Katherine, the Duchess Tremontaine. Theron and his mother live, not in Tremontaine House, but in Riverside House, the great house Alec built where the little house he once lived in with Richard St. Vier had stood. The Riverside neighborhood has ha d some of the edge taken off of it by the effects of the presence of a great household, and the civilizing influence of Sophia. (Sophia, not long after arriving in the city, successfully badged the University into letting her study medicine, and operates a clinic for the residents of Riverside.) It's still a rough and dangerous place, though, and naturally Theron likes it better than the Hill, where all proper young noblemen belong.
He likes the University even better, especially after he meets Basil St. Cloud, a magister who teaches, and studies, ancient history--the early history of the Kings who came down from the north and ruled with wizards by their sides. Everyone knows that the wizards were charlatans and the kings were dupes and puppets. Basil wonders if everyone is right, and persists in his academically unfashionable practice of reading contemporary documents rather than just the official and unofficial histories, until he find a very dangerous book.
Meanwhile, as Basil and Theron become lovers, the Serpent Chancellor, Lord Arlen, becomes concerned about a possible northern plot to restore the kings. He sets an ambitious young nobleman, Lord Nicholas Galing, to investigate. Galing quickly becomes less interested in finding out if there's a plot than in proving that Theron and Basil are part of it.
The politics of the city and the politics of the University are sticky and intricate, and get more so when they become tangled up in each other. Theron's idealism and his self-absorption both feel quite convincingly real. The same is true of Basil, who really isn't very many years older, and in some ways is even less realistic than Theron about what he can get away. No one in this story is perfect, and no one in it is just a cardboard bad guy, either. These are real people, with real motivations. Beautifully done, and worth the wait.
In her novel Swordspoint, Ellen Kushner crafted a fantasy setting
Theron Campion is the heir to the house of Tremontaine, but has recently exited a scandalous love affair with an artist. He takes solace in the university where he meets Basil St. Cloud, a young magister who holds controversial views regarding the ancient kings and their wizards and historical methodology. But with unrest in the North and some agitating for the return of the kings, Theron and Basil find themselves at the center of something greater than they ever could have imagined.
The Fall of Kings is much more mythic in tone than other Riverside stories. It’s a larger perspective, looking back into the history of the country and of its old kings and wizards. It’s also the only Riverside story so far to feature magic in any capacity. And while I wouldn’t say any of the other Riverside books I’ve read have been necessarily happily ever after (although The Privilege of the Sword comes the closest), The Fall of Kings is the most tragic. It’s basically a slowly unfolding disaster, and by a certain point I knew it couldn’t possibly end well.
On the other hand, it can be hard to grieve for either Theron or Basil. There were moments where I felt sympathetic for them, but they are both so utterly self centered. Despite their protestations of love, there didn’t seem to be much more to their relationship than sex. Combined with some atrocious behavior on Theron’s part, it’s no wonder that the relationship implodes. Seriously, if Alec’s famously been called the “boyfriend from hell,” Theron gives him a run for his money.
The cast of characters is almost predominantly male. There are a few female characters (Katherine, Sophia, Jessica), but we never get to spend much time with them, although Jessica at least does get to effect the plot. It actually makes a lot of sense that this was written before The Privilege of the Sword, where the female characters do have more of a presence at the story line actually examines the patriarchal society it’s established instead of leaving it unquestioned.
While The Fall of Kings is far from my favorite Riverside story, it has reminded me of two things. Firstly, Ellen Kushner (and presumably Delia Sherman, her co-author here) is an absolutely brilliant writer. She’s someone who really knows how to craft prose. Secondly, Riverside has one a place in my heart. I love seeing the same setting and sometimes characters over the course of the eighty odd years this series spans. I really need to track down those short stories Ellen Kushner set between books…
I would strongly recommend the Riverside novels to anyone who’s a fan of fantasy driven by intrigue instead of magic or stories focused around queer characters. However, The Fall of Kings is not the book I would recommend starting the series with.
Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
Skip this, assume it was nice,
The University world that they populate is full of young men with aspirations and a lust for learning (and sometimes for each other), with professors who encourage their students and discourage those who dispute them, and the progeny of their first book [Swordspoint]. While the majority of the characters are young men, there are a number of women in power behind the scenes who are powers in their own rights. And this book and its characters transcend gender because of the vulnerability and learning that serves as the focus of this particular sequel.
The Fall of the Kings follows the messy romance of a young nobleman who hasn't quite figured himself out and a young scholar who is really, really bad at departmental politics. Their attempts to realize their destinies get tangled up in ancient magic. I liked Theron and Basil an awful lot, but their lack of self-awareness (and self-preservation!) is frustrating. They are both such earnest, clueless guys and as a result they become passive characters, swept along by magic and the engine of the story. I have a notion that Kushner and Sherman didn't have an ending in mind when they started writing, and the plot, while pleasingly organic, lacks the intensity of the other Riverside novels.
That said, after a muddy middle, there was a lot to enjoy in the third act. Theron's swashbuckling art dealer/pirate half-sister Jessica is a delightful character who absolutely works despite showing up late in the game. I found Theron's resolution satisfying as well, even if it's a bit out of left field.
As for Basil, this time round I realized this is a novel about dealing with the legacy of problematic intellectual pioneers, who are brilliant one moment and weighed down with scandal and junk theories the next. I think this is one of the strongest themes in the book and would have liked to see it more in the forefront.
At the end of the day, The Fall of the Kings is a book as messy and fascinating as Basil St. Cloud's scholarship. I wouldn't recommend it to those who haven't read Kushner and Sherman's other works, but it's certainly a must-read for Riverside completists.