(no subject)

[skygiants]

I read a review of T. Kingfisher's Clocktaur Wars duology that said it was "strangely difficult to describe," which puzzles me because I find it really easy to describe: it's a quest fantasy in which a small group of quirky characters attempt to complete a dangerous mission, while the DM the author occasionally throws backstory complications at them! I mean, it's an extremely very enjoyable iteration of this kind of story but the structure is very classic RPG.

For our character classes we have:

THE ROGUE - Slate, party leader, a pragmatic forger with code-breaking, lockpicking, and false-accounting skills who has Made Enemies In Her Time!
THE ASSASSIN - Brenner, the rogue's Snarky, Amoral, and Deadly ex-boyfriend!
THE PALADIN - Caliban, who used to kill demons until he got possessed by a demon and murdered a lot of people, now haunted by his former possession and his crimes! (but still very paladin-y)
THE SCHOLAR - Learned Edmund, a brilliant idealistic-but-clueless (and misogynistic) nineteen-year-old nerd from a cloistered scholarly order who has to Learn About The Real World!

With eventual bonus companion
THE GNOLE - Grimehug, an adorable but amoral nonhuman critter from an enemy city!

The country is being attacked by mysterious and unstoppable living clockwork critters from Anuket City, so everyone except the scholar and the gnole have been recruited from out of the prisons to go on a quest to Anuket City and figure out how they're being made and how to stop them, with magic tattoos that will eat them if they diverge from their mission.

(Learned Edmund volunteered and also was never in prison, so he doesn't get a murder tattoo.)

The first book, The Clockwork Boys, features the Gathering of the Fellowship and Questing Adventures; the second, The Wonder Engine, is Investigation In Anuket City. The party bonds, Caliban and Slate progress from UST to dedicated pining, demons and weird magic and occasional plagues and Slate's old enemies all provide complication, and it all feeds a very specific kind of fun fantasy quest party itch.

As a sidenote, I would one hundred percent have known that this book was written as a response to playing lots of Dragon Age even if T. Kingfisher hadn't said so in one of the author's notes, because the entire ending sequence felt EXACTLY like a Bioware boss fight, complete with a final villain that's programmed to nyoom along a limited track and shriek insults at you as you attempt to complete a programmatic task without being killed by respawning minions. I kept expecting to see the progress bar for Slate's lockpicking.

Comments

[kate_nepveu]

I have no idea if these were good books because my brain kept going Doctrine of Labyrinths - Chalion - Pratchett, all of which were intensely important to me, and I couldn't see the forest for the trees! Totally my fault, not the books, they are entitled to draw on common trope pools all they like, just.

[thistleingrey]

Pratchett would be a particular hard reference point-set, I'd think, because there's so very much in his books.

(I'd like to read Kingfisher and not only Vernon, at some point, but this one may not be for me given probably unpopular opinions about the Dragon Age games.)

[lemon_badgeress]

It might not be the best starting point, but I think the characterization might carry you along over any bits of the plot you were irked at.

[skygiants]

Depending on your unpopular opinions, you might find it satisfying -- Kingfisher I think was also reacting to a certain degree against.

[thistleingrey]

Thanks--that's good to know!

[skygiants]

Of these three trope sets, I only know the Pratchett! It didn't feel overwhelmingly Pratchett-y to me, though the influence is certainly there.

[kate_nepveu]

The gnoles just felt very Pratchett, fairly or not, to me.