The Hounds Of Avalon (The Dark Age Saga book 3) by Mark Chadbourn
01/07/2005 . Source: Phil Jones 
pub: Gollancz. 374 page enlarged paperback. Price: £10.99 (UK only). ISBN: 0-575-07278-4. Buy from Amazon US - Buy from Amazon UK
nb: US titles may only be available from Amazon US, and UK titles from Amazon UK. check out website: www.orionbooks.co.uk
This is the third and final book in 'The Dark Age' trilogy. To recap, the world has fallen into confusion after the Fall. Gods and strange creatures have crossed over from other realities and a huge battle was fought by humankind. Technology didn't work as it used to and magic was now as normal as electricity is today. Government and society fell into disarray. A huge battle was fought and five men and women, the brothers and sisters of the Dragon, fought to save mankind. A small victory was had but the leader Churchill was lost presumed dead and the rest, shattered by the events in one way or another. These events are covered by the first trilogy 'The Age Of Misrule'.
'The Dark Age' books introduce us to the 'new' brothers and sisters of the Dragon. The old ones loose most of their Pendragon spirit or blue flame and a new five emerge when needed. There is a new enemy though, The Void. The opposite of existence. Its aim is to eradicate and destroy existence for good. Some of the so-called gods wish to eradicate humans and stop them from finding a higher level of existence but others oppose them and a huge civil war ensues. Some of the Golden Ones fighting for existence and some for the total opposite.
This is an interesting book to end this trilogy on. We get to meet and greet three of the 'old' brothers and sisters of the Dragons and Mallory, Sophie and Caitlin from the previous two books, 'Devil In Green' and 'The Queen Of Sinister'. We also have two new characters, Hunter and Hal. Hunter is special forces trained and an operative for the government which is desperately seeking a solution to winning the war and a way to cross over to the otherworld. Hal, on the other hand, is more studious. Doing research for the government, he is good friends with Hunter although they are like chalk and cheese, they are some how drawn together.
The government and the military decide there only course of action is to capture any brothers and sisters of the Dragon they know about. Hunter is sent on a mission with a handful of men to extract Mallory and Sophie and bring them back to Oxford where the government is now based. The mission goes wrong and although Mallory is captured, Sophie is shot by one of the grunts and so Mallory believes killed.
There is a lot going on in this last book. Bringing together both characters, plot-lines, ideas and threads from previous books, it is finishes being less character driven. There are many characters to get through both old and new. A lot of ideas thrown at you and re-introduced. Chadbourn plays a complex game. Again, we have the heady mix of Celtic gods, myths, Arthurian legend, world belief systems to name a few thrown into the pot. The legend of King Arthur is used in a lot of books and although this is a major player in the overall plot, it is attacked in a fresh way. You can get Tibetan Buddhism, Christianity, Celtic gods and quantum physics all on the same page.
This could go horrendously wrong. Chadbourn manages to steer away, for the most part, from mainstream fantasy style but still include their elements. If you really wanted to classify these books, I would say Urban Fantasy. Not that I like putting books in a pigeonhole. Often, though, some of the ideas presented such as multiple worlds or realities co-existing are more of the Science fiction fraternity. This blend allows Chadbourn enormous freedom. Characters and plot are played with. Although The Void on the surface is shown to be the true enemy, scrape away the top layer and there are a whole strata of differing greys. There is a distinct flavour of distrust of government and organised society which is never a bad thing. The sheer wealth of information presented to the reader could lead to what appears to be an overly researched book. Again, though, through careful plotting and using the characters, especially that of Hal, the information is delivered painlessly along with the story.
Chadbourn is not afraid to take a chance. Characters are given importance and reverence, but they are not sacred. The ending, too, is final to some degree and yes, it ends this trilogy but there are plenty of questions left to be explored. You get to find out what the 'new' government is like and how it operates along with what's left of the military which was seldom touch on in previous books in the series.
You could, if you really wanted, read this in isolation but that would be a real loss. As a series, it's probably not the strongest book, but it provides the reader with quite a few answers to questions that were presented in earlier books. Oh, I'll be honest, I loved this book and I can wait for the next.
Phil Jones |
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