Book Review: Song of the Dragon by Tracy and Laura Hickman

 It's
been a while since I've read a pure Fantasy novel, at least one for
review (War of the Spider Queen, I'll get to you eventually).  Let's
take a look at this one, the first book in a trilogy, the third entry of
which is released on July 3rd of this year.  I've got the first two
books here, courtesy of Fantasy & SciFi Lovin' News & Reviews,
so let's see what I think of them before the new one comes out.



Drakis
is a soldier, the equivalent of a Corporal in a multiracial legion led
by Elves.  Let me go over the races in this world, because while they're
not so far off of Tolkien that you'll be clueless, they're far enough
off that they bear some explanation.



Let's start with the Elves. 
These are probably the farthest off of Tolkien you're likely to find. 
They're described as having elongated heads and very corpse-like
appearances.  If you guessed that these elves are evil, you're right in
one.  The elves conquered the known world millennia ago, or at least
years ago.  More on that later.



The dwarves are the last nation to
stand up against the elves, but by the time we're through with the
first Act, Drakis and his Octian are part of the Legion that leads to
their final defeat.  Dwarves are exactly what you know them to be.



Next
we get manticores, which are in the unusual position of being one of
the main sentient races of this world.  They're exactly what you expect,
part lion, part man, part eagle.  They're big, able to fly, able to
talk shit, and almost completely enslaved.



The oddest by far of
these races is the chimerians.  While they may have an original form,
they're best known as shapeshifters, able to take the form of any
creature.  Most lack the ability to change their skin into clothing, but
Ethis, the one we deal with, has that ability, because it adds to the
tension, or at least gives the other characters reason to distrust him
and gives him reason to do things unexplained.



And... oh, the
humans.  Apparently, the humans and the dragons were united as the
rightful rulers of this land before the elves came in.  Now they're
little more than a curiosity, talked down and degraded even by the other
slaves and found only in scarce numbers.



But the winners write
history, and here's where the true sinister strength of the Rhonas
Empire lies.  They control the Aether of this world, making them the
sole wielders- or at least, pretty close to it, as it seems the Fae and
the Dwarves have scarce amounts- of magic.  This enables them to do
things like having daily rituals, called Devotions, where everybody in a
House, slave or otherwise, are subjected to magic controlled by the
powers that be that influences their beliefs and memories.  Ever wish
you could forget that stupid thing you said?  Well, if the person
administering Devotions in your house shares that belief, not only could
you forget you said it, but so would the person you said it to.  And
all of the witnesses.



Now, I've been making mostly light of this,
but upon discovering what the Devotions really are, this is when the
novel gets deadly serious.  This is around the time that loyal warrior
slave Drakis realizes that he gets regularly beat within an inch of
death by his Master, Sha Timuran, only to be saved from death by
Timuran's daughter so that she can rape him while he heals, and then
arrange for Drakis's lover Mala to discover him "cheating" on her. 
Yeah, that pretty much wiped the smile off your face, didn't it?



For
the rest of the book, we follow the newly formed adventuring party-
Drakis, the warrior, presumed to be the Chosen One because he more
closely matches a prophesy that hundreds of human slaves named Drakis
mostly match, except for the part that they never escaped.  Talk about a
self-fulfilling prophecy; I have a feeling the next two books will
reveal some sort of intelligence (perhaps The Wizard That Did It)
planting the titular Song of the Dragon into the minds of human slaves
named Drakis in order to convince them to fulfill the prophecy.



The
quest is a mission to find the characters' homes and backstories (their
past), the relationships that will survive as they regain their
memories of slavery (their present) and whether or not Drakis will
fulfill the prophecy (their future).  As the quest is well underway, a
new character and plotline is introduced, yet even Soen-the-badass Iblisi, who travels along a parallel quest in the traditional one man
army style.  He's not quite the sixth Ranger, (partially because the
base Party consists of seven individuals) but he potentially could take
on this role.



Altogether this book is filled with a lot of
world-building and a lot of convoluted details.  These details don't
necessarily kill the story now, but if gives you the impression that you
really hope it comes to a point in the sequels rather than resulting in
the worst kind of padding- the kind that actually detracts from the
main story if it doesn't lead anywhere.



In between the plot, we
get a lot of really cool action.  Most of this is with the Iblisi but
it's still interesting watching Drakis and the crew try to get their way
out of certain situations.  Drakis is really the closest thing we have
to an open book (unless you count Soen), and the lack of knowing who to
trust or whose backstory is real lends a lot to the tone of the novel. 
You're in the dark a lot of the time, forcing both Drakis and the reader
to sit back, stay on the DM author's tracks and find out what's ka.  Er, destiny.   No, seriously, you're awesome if you're not scratching your head right now.  Plot convenience like a wheel.





I
joke, but in all seriousness I'm enjoying the ride.  It does feel like
we're on some strict rails, but that gives me faith that some of the
more questionable things (ie, everything involving Mala or Ethis) are
actually relevant and not just padding.  A story isn't normally this
tightly controlled, only to have padding like this added in after the
fact.



Judgment reserved until I finish the trilogy, but so far it
looks like it's pretty good.  I can't wait to dig into my copy of the
second book and I definitely hope to get the chance to read the third. 
There's nothing to say that I won't change my mind by the time I get
there, but right now I don't think that's going to be the case.