Monday, August 31, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Bone Shard Daughter by Andrea Stewart




Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on September 8, 2020 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.


The Bone Shard Daughter is the first in a new epic fantasy trilogy by debut author Andrea Stewart.  The novel was not on my radar at first, but like a lot of the books I read, I saw a few authors I like mentioning it on twitter and then was offered a chance at a pre-release copy by the publisher.  The novel is not nearly as long as the last few epic fantasy novels I've read, which was another plus, so I decided to give it a chance despite having way too many advance review copies of books to review when I picked it up.

And The Bone Shard Daughter is a very solid and enjoyable epic fantasy novel.  The story contains a lot of classic tropes: the child with a mysterious past, an Empire that long ago defeated a magical threat that hasn't been seen for years, a rebellion brewing against that Empire, etc.  But Stewart weaves these tropes together in interesting ways, with two primary main characters whose stories easily carry the plot to go along with several lesser ones to spruce up the setting.  Add in a final point of view character who provides tantalizing hints of what's to come and a prose that made this incredibly easy to read quickly, and you've got a series-opener that I definitely enjoyed.


--------------------------------------------------Plot Summary----------------------------------------------------
The Empire was founded upon the use of bone shard magic, in which shards of its citizens can be used to create constructs to do everything from spy on the populace, fight its enemies, or administer the realities of the state.  Long ago, the magically powerful Alanga controlled the Islands of the Empire, until the Emperor's bone shard magic drove them off seemingly for good, but the Empire maintains its rule by taking the shards of its citizens, who know that at any moment the power of their taken shards can be called upon, leading to their sickness and death.

Lin is the 23 year old daughter of the Emperor, although she's basically never been beyond the palace walls.  Her father treats her as broken due to the sickness that claimed the memories of all but her last 5 years, and forces her to compete with the boy he is fostering, Bayan, for his attention - with access to the rooms of the palace blocked by locked doors to which only her father has the keys.  Frustrated with her father seeming to favor Bayan, and his refusal to teach her magic and give her the keys, she embarks on a reckless plan to prove herself...only to discover truths she could never have imagined.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the Empire, travels the wanted smuggler known as Jovis, the man known for defying the Empire's laws and having not given up a shard.  Jovis wants one thing only really - to find the mysterious ship that took away his wife long ago, which seems also to be responsible for other disappearances on the island.  But when he takes a last second job to smuggle a boy off an island before his shard can be taken, he gets caught up in a catastrophe powerful enough to sink an entire island.  Soon Jovis' fame will only grow and he will find himself caught in a rebellion against the Empire as more and more people seek refuge for their children, and the people begin to seek another way.

Jovis and Lin, far apart in stature and location, will play a major part in the changing of the Empire.  For forces unbeknownst to them are on the move, and promise to change everything to come, and they will both find themselves caught up in that change.....
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Like a lot of epic fantasy novels, The Bone Shard Daughter switches between a number of different characters' points of view - five in all here.  Two characters are clearly however the main ones of this part of the series - Jovis and Lin - and their perspectives are told in first person.  The other three characters - Phalue, the daughter and heir to a local governor; Ranami, the poor local girl who Phalue loves and who wants to fight injustices of rule; and Sand, a woman with uncertain memories on a strange far off island - have their stories told in third person, and their perspectives often disappear for large portions of time. As you may expect if you've read novels like this before, these side points of view intersect with our other main characters - except for one which mostly serves as a tease of what's really going on and for future novels in this series.

But again, as you can figure from the plot summary I gave above, the two main characters are Lin and Jovis, two very different characters who might as well be in separate stories for most of the plot.  Lin is the eponymous daughter, a young woman desperate to prove herself worthy of being her father's heir and of obtaining the magic she believes is her birthright - a problem made difficult by her father's obsession with her regaining memories and seeming favoritism of her foster brother.  Lin is sheltered - having never really been beyond the palace much if at all - but even despite that sheltering and need for approval, she still can see that her father's governance is cruel, and wants not just to succeed him but to be a better ruler than him.  As her storyline goes on, and she risks more and more to fulfill her ambition and discover the powers needed to prove herself, she finds these two needs - to be more worthy and powerful vs to be a better and more just ruler - in conflict and the story really works well to show this conflict, which makes her very easy to like.  And Lin's ingenuity in how she goes about dealing with her problems as well as the intriguing discoveries she makes along the way, helps keep her part of the story fascinating throughout.

Jovis is very different because Jovis is the opposite of sheltered.  From an outsider people, Jovis' treatment by the Empire led him to becoming a smuggler for a crime lord, who provided the magical material needed to keep his ship moving in exchange for his services.  But Jovis doesn't care about all of that, what he cares about is tracking down his wife, the woman of his dreams, who was taken all those years ago, and when he found traces of the boat that took her, he dropped everything to chase after her.  But like Lin, while Jovis doesn't see himself as caring as to the general state of the Empire, he's really a good person at heart, and while he convinces himself he's only helping individuals get away from the Empire's tithe for the money, it's clearly self delusion.  Like Lin, his personal goals conflict with his good nature and like her, he's extremely creative in getting around problems that others consider insurmountable.

Both of these characters' storylines - Lin attempting to sneak around the palace for her father's secrets to prove herself and then eventually surpass him, to become a better ruler, only to discover strange secrets and Jovis' travel around the islands looking for his wife, helping kids along the way, only to become part of a greater movement to help people, are really strong and enjoyable and help this storyline move at a rather quick pace: i read this book in 2 days when I really didn't think I'd be able to pull that off, but i read really quickly.  The side characters, particularly Phalue and Ramani, are a bit more of a miss: their storyline is even more tropey than the others - Phalue as the governor's heir, half commoner but still privileged and needs to be shown the misery of others to realize she has to do something, and Ramani as her commoner lover who is working with resistance to do even more than that - and honestly, it's kind of not as interesting as a result until it intersects with the main storylines.  They're likable enough, but just don't stand out, especially compared to the main duo.  Meanwhile Sand's storyline is clearly more of the classic epic fantasy far-away storyline meant to set up the overall series myth arc, and while it works it disappears for good portions of the time.

The result is a book that is for the most part strong, taking characters and tropes that aren't in general that original but executing upon them very well, leading to an ending that is rather satisfying, while also providing quite a bit for the next book to act upon.  The magic of the setting, which I somehow haven't mentioned throughout this review, is particularly fun to read, with the bone shards essentially being magical programming that Lin has to figure out how to rewrite for her own purposes and that really livens up the plot a good bit.  Still, the book almost feels like a prequel for the main story more than a first book, with the real big events only just about to come, which is kind of annoying.

In short, The Bone Shard Daughter is a fun start to a new epic fantasy trilogy, with a solid main duo of characters, a fascinating magic system, and intriguing cliffhangers....but while it tells a complete story, it also goes very light on the myth arc of the series, leaving that for future books to get into.  The result is a very quick and enjoyable read for a 400 page novel, but one which almost feels a bit too fluffy and not yet to the point - which is something  I hope the sequel eventually corrects.


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