Sabaa Tahir: A Torch against the Night
May. 28th, 2018 01:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bibliogrammaIn A Torch Against the Night, Sabaa Tahir continues the story of Elias and Laia, two people with very different pasts struggling against an empire that has become corrupt, violent and cruel.
Elias and Laia, fleeing the destruction of the military complex of Blackcliff, part military training school, part imperial barracks, part prison, have embarked on a desperate mission to free Laia’s brother Darien from the feared prison of Kaur.
The ascent to power of the new Emperor Marcus, a particularly vicious former Mask - a magically augmented Imperial soldier - has brought about political instability, which Elias’s mother, Keris, the ruthless Commandant of the Imperial Academy, seeks to use for her own ambitions. The rebellion of the .scholars, a conquered servant class, has been brutally put down by Marcus and the Commandant, and Helene Aquila, Elias’ former ally, has been appointed Blood Shrike - the leader of the Emperor’s personal military force, the Black Guard - and her first task is to find, torture and execute Elias for his treason.
It’s a non-stop chase across deserts and mountains, with the political terrain as uncertain as the physical. Allies are tested, traitors uncovered, unlikely partnerships formed, and long-laid plots revealed.
Tahir takes her characters in directions I had not expected, and the twists in the story kept me quite fully engaged. Looking forward to the next volume.
Elias and Laia, fleeing the destruction of the military complex of Blackcliff, part military training school, part imperial barracks, part prison, have embarked on a desperate mission to free Laia’s brother Darien from the feared prison of Kaur.
The ascent to power of the new Emperor Marcus, a particularly vicious former Mask - a magically augmented Imperial soldier - has brought about political instability, which Elias’s mother, Keris, the ruthless Commandant of the Imperial Academy, seeks to use for her own ambitions. The rebellion of the .scholars, a conquered servant class, has been brutally put down by Marcus and the Commandant, and Helene Aquila, Elias’ former ally, has been appointed Blood Shrike - the leader of the Emperor’s personal military force, the Black Guard - and her first task is to find, torture and execute Elias for his treason.
It’s a non-stop chase across deserts and mountains, with the political terrain as uncertain as the physical. Allies are tested, traitors uncovered, unlikely partnerships formed, and long-laid plots revealed.
Tahir takes her characters in directions I had not expected, and the twists in the story kept me quite fully engaged. Looking forward to the next volume.