SciFi/Fantasy Novella Review: Penric's Fox by Lois McMaster Bujold

Penric's Fox is the fifth published novella in Lois McMaster Bujold's Penric and Desdemona series, but it's the first to be published out of order chronologically.  It's actually a midquel, taking place between "Penric and the Shaman" and "Penric's Mission", and really serves as somewhat of a direct sequel to Penric and the Shaman.

For those new to the Penric stories, they follow Penric, a young man who accidentally becomes the host of a chaos demon in a fantasy world, when its previous bearer, a temple sorcerer, unexpectedly dies as she is traveling nearby.  Demons in this world can give the bearer the ability to use chaos magic (or uphill magic, at a cost), but have their own personalities, with older demons having multiple personalities, each one based upon the personality and experiences of a former host.  Penric takes the unusual - maybe unique - step of naming his demon Desdemona, and the banter between the two (counting Des as one being, which she really isn't) is a prominent feature of the series as he goes on various adventures.

Note:  You shouldn't start the series with this novella, but you could jump in right after Penric's Demon.  Still you'll be better off having read Penric and the Shaman as well prior to this one.




Quick Plot Summary:  Penric's vacation with his new friend Shaman Inglis, a few months after "Penric and the Shaman," is cut short when their friend Locator Oswyl comes to them with a disturbing new case:  A Temple Sorceress found murdered by two arrows stuck in her back.  And even more concerning to Pen, there's no sign of her demon anywhere, except in that there are traces of a fox at the scene.  To track down the fox, which is the most likely new bearer of the demon, Penric will need to call in some extra help from Inglis' shaman friends, but he'll have to avoid the murderer, who's still out there, in the process.

Penric's Fox harkens back toward the first two novellas in the series, with it following solely the voices of Des and Pen (as opposed to the Mission/Dance novellas, which alternate his POV with that of Nikys).  As usual it's a pretty cute adventure, held together by the great voices and characters of Pen and Des, and bolstered by the addition of several new Shamans who are brought in to help.  Is it groundbreaking work?  Not at all - the mystery culprits are pretty obvious even to the characters fairly early, for example - but it's fun light fare with an interesting moral dilemma at the end for the characters to ponder.  I'd probably rank this fourth out of the five parts of the series I've read (I haven't read the newest novella yet), but it's still a fine piece of work.