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EUROPE'S MOST VISITED SF/F WEB SITE |
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Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey Kushiel's Chosen by Jacqueline Carey check out website: www.Tor.com
A peer of the realm, Anafiel Delauney, is the only person who realises what it denotes and transforms what had been her flaw into a mote of rare value. The world Carey creates is at once familiar and alien. Terre D'Ange - the land of the Angels - is Phedré 's birthplace and as you can tell by the name bears resemblance to France. It is bordered by countries that are recognisable as Italy, Germany, Greece, Spain and Britain.
Elua was abandoned by the One God and a number of angels in revolt of this lack of love came down to look after and be companions of this unwanted son. One of these angels was Kushiel, the gatekeeper and punisher of Hell. He defected when she realised there was no place in Heaven for the kind of love that developed between the punisher and the punished. He came to Earth to follow Elua's precept ‘Love as thou wilt’. So with traces of the heavenly ichor still in their veins, the D'Angelines are more beautiful and more gifted than the people of the surrounding countries. The resulting covetousness and envy is the focus of ‘Kushiel's Dart’. This threat, although overtly carried out by foreign forces, is engineered by a D'Angeline villainess Machiavelli would have been proud to be a disciple of and her reason for her actions is simply because she can. These two books are amazingly well-written, told in the first person with Phedré as the speaker. This method is not always pleasing. It is often limited having only one storyline to follow. However, Carey's heroine is so well-defined, created in such detail, that hearing the tale from her is no hardship. There is very little in the novel that is extraneous or unnecessary, so whilst the reader is given only one side of the story, Phedré's interactions with the characters she does meet are intriguing enough to hold attention. Phedré nó Delauney is a beautiful heroine who brings to life the classical hetaira and infuses her service with glamour. She is also refreshingly human. Self-deprecating in that she credits any success she achieves to her luck or curse in being stricken by Kushiel's Dart. Her loyalty to her Queen and country is threatened by her own destructive love for the villainess and as we journey around the world of ‘Kushiel's Dart’ and ‘Kushiel's Chosen’, carried safe in Phedré's head we see her struggle against her own nature to do what is right. Terre D'Ange is land that defies the reader not to fall in love with it. It is a world of grace and the sins of angels are made the glories of this race. A warning must be given, however. These books will challenge sexual proclivities- daring the reader to consider wider options shall we say and dare to live by Elua's precept: ‘Love as thou wilt’. Sana Master
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OTHER REVIEWS - May 2003
Untied Kingdom by James Lovegrove Dark Terrors 6: The Gollancz Book Of Horror edited by Stephen Jones Star Trek: Enterprise: Surak’s Soul by JM Dillard The Mammoth Book Of Future Cops - by Maxim Jakubowski For Love And Glory by Poul Anderson Super-State: A Novel Of Future Europe by Brian Aldiss The Velocity Gospel (Accomplice Book 2) by Steve Aylett Storm Of Wings (Dragonmaster: Book One) by Chris Bunch Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Tales Of The Slayer Volume 2 Son Of Man by Robert Silverberg Smallville: Whodunnit by Dean Wesley Smith 3SF # 3 publisher: Ben Jeapes. editor: Liz Holiday Star Trek: Nemesis - Novelisation The Assassin’s Edge by Juliet E. McKenna Kushiel's Dart & Kushiel's Chosen by Jacqueline Carey One More For The Road by Ray Bradbury Foundation: The International Review Of Science Fiction # 86
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Phedré
is a beautiful young woman touched by the Gods. She is sold into
the service of Naamah, the honoured profession of the courtesan,
as a young child but she is outcast because of a pinprick of scarlet
that mares the liquid brown of her left eye. 
Only
Delauney recognises that the celestial fingerprints that traverse
Phedré's soul manifest in the scarlet mote. It symbolises
Kushiel's Dart, marking her as one who will forever experience pleasure
in pain. Delauney trains Phedré to listen, observe, think
and this training, as well as that of pleasure, equips Phedré
to deal with the political intrigues Delauney thrusts her into.
The
myth Carey creates is a fantastic blend of the ancient Greek, Roman,
Christian and Jewish faiths. The land of Terre D'Ange, however,
is distinct in that all of its people are descended from the son
of Yeshua (Jesus) called Elua. This son was born from a union between
the blood of Yeshua and the tears of the Magdalene and given birth
by Mother Earth. 
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