The Demon King | |||||
Chris Bunch | |||||
Warner Aspect, 509 pages | |||||
A review by Todd Richmond
The book opens with Damastes traveling to Kallio, a province that has not yet shown obedience to the
Emperor. Damastes' job is to bring order to the province. He is hampered in this task by the Emperor's
inept brother, the prince regent of Kallio. He does his best to fulfill the Emperor's orders but is
thwarted by a treacherous wizard, who leads an attack on the city and kills the Emperor's brother.
Damastes and his men succeed in defeating the wizard and destroying his army but the Emperor is not
satisfied. He commands Damastes to exact horrifying revenge on the citizens of Kallio. Damastes,
however, is a man of honor, and refuses to carry out the Emperor's orders. As he puts it:
His career is not over, however, and after a long period of waiting, the Emperor again
summons him. Tenedos is convinced that war with Maisir, the great country to the south,
is inevitable. So he places Damastes in charge of Numantia's army to prepare them for
war. But later, Tenedos tells Damastes that he has cast a spell that shows that if they
go to war with Maisir, they will be destroyed. So he sends Damastes as a peace emissary
to the King of Maisir. Damastes negotiates a peace treaty, but is stunned when the Emperor
betrays him and the Maisirians and attacks without warning.
Despite the betrayal, Damastes later returns to serve the Emperor and lead a senseless war
against Maisir. He blindly follows his oath to serve the Emperor and keep his family's
honor, 'We Hold True.' It is not until the very end of the book, after millions have
died, that he finally takes action.
This is the main story that weaves through the book. There are other subplots and stories
as well. Damastes' relationship with his wife Marán and the alluring Amiel (a
fair warning, this book contains graphic sexual content). His struggle with the Tovieti,
a killer cult who hates the Emperor and those who serve him. His conflicts with the
aristocracy and rebels who would overthrow the Emperor, just as he and Tenedos had done
less than a decade earlier. All of these elements are interwoven with the main story line.
I enjoyed this book, as I enjoy all of Chris Bunch's work, but I felt frustrated after I
finished it. From the very first chapter, we know that something bad is going to happen.
There will, of course, be a third book, one that promises that Damastes will take a more
active role, but one can't help but feel that this entire book was just an introduction to
the next one. But I guess that is the nature of trilogies. Still, I really enjoyed
The Demon King and Bunch's storytelling. He knows how to write about war and
battle, intrigue and betrayal, and this book highlights that. His depiction of the
Numantian's "advance" against the Maisirians is both griping and horrifying. The
senseless waste of lives and the horrible conditions are clearly illustrated, making you
wonder how soldiers in a campaign like this could ever go on from day to day. It also
clearly shows how a sense of duty and honor can sometimes be carried too far, something
we have seen in our own history.
Todd is a plant molecular developmental biologist who has finally finished 23 years of formal education. He recently fled Madison, WI for the warmer but damper San Francisco Bay Area and likes bad movies, good science fiction, and role-playing games. He began reading science fiction at the age of eight, starting with Heinlein, Silverberg, and Tom Swift books, and has a great fondness for tongue-in-cheek fantasy àla Terry Pratchett, Craig Shaw Gardner and Robert Asprin. |
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