Witch King

Like many other people I discovered Martha Wells via the Murderbot series. Until I saw the press for this book I had no idea she was also an accomplished fantasy author. I guess I have more stories to go back and read!

I really loved the characters in this one. This is one of those stories that flips between the Origin Story where everyone meets amidst a crisis and Current Day where they are reunited to face a new crisis. I thought the characters' relationships in the Present Day flowed well from how they met in the Origin Story, and their interactions were both natural and entertaining.

I thought the plot in the Origin Story timeline was more exciting, even if there wasn't much tension since you knew certain characters appear in the Current Day and hence couldn't have died. It's a story of war and defeat and desperation which is tough to beat.

The Current Day story line is much thinner and involves mystery and conspiracy but honestly it doesn't feel like much happens so much as you're spending time with these characters as they deal with their current problem.

As far as I know this is a standalone novel but I wouldn't mind seeing more of this setting and these characters.

Habe das (Hör-)Buch bei 12% abgebrochen. So der ich Murderbot Diaries mag, so sehr hat mich Witch Kind gelangweilt. Ich konnte zu keinem Charakter eine Verbindung aufbauen und das ist eine schlechte Grundlage um einer so komplexen Story akustisch zu folgen. Das Hörbuch begann tatsächlich mit einer mehr als drei Minuten andauernden Aufzählung von absurd vielen Charakteren, von denen viele noch Spitznamen hatten und in Beziehung zu anderen Charakteren standen,… Natürlich konnte ich dem nicht folgen, ich kannte ja noch nicht mal einen der Charas. Kein guter Start.

Der Rest der 12%, die ich gehört habe, unterschied sich allein in einem Aspekt positiv von 0815-Fantasy: Das Setting war nicht irgendwo im europäischen Mittelalter. Vielmehr zogen die Personen umher, waren vielleicht Beduinen oder ähnliche nicht-sesshafte Gruppen.

Aber alles andere war so langweilig: Hauptcharakter männlich (wenn auch nicht hetero), „the chosen one“ (wenn auch Dämon), rechtschaffend-gut obwohl Dämon, … und was mich immer besonders irkt: Natürlich haben die wichtigen Leute alle Bedienstete-bis-Sklaven, die möglicherweise durch weniger-reinblütig-sein an diesen Platz kamen… Urgh.

Das ist mit alles zu monarchistisch, da höre ich lieber ein paar langweilige, heteronormative Grusel-Hörspiele bis das nächste Murderbot-Hörbuch in der Bücherei verfügbar ist.

Witch King features a lot of worldbuilding. Its fantasy world is inhabited by different people with different cultures, and people who can different sorts of magic in different sorts of way, and Martha Wells manages to weave details about this world into the story in a way that makes the world feel alive (except for all the dead people).

The setting is also one with a history of dramatic upheavals and epic struggles, though the story is not set during those things. The main narrative is set years after major historical events, whose effects are still felt by the present-day characters. We also get flashbacks of events around the major historical events. In this way, the book tells a history by telling of its aftermath, and the events that preceded it. This is something that could be executed poorly, leaving a disappointing gap, but it actually works pretty well in Witch King.

We also do get a bunch of likeable characters doing an adventure together, which is something Martha Wells does well, and she does not disappoint this time.

This one is difficult to rate for me. I only had 7 days to read it but it's a book that needs to be savoured. You should take your time with it. So I probably didn't get the full experience. The narrative starts right in the middle of a story that has a long backstory some of which the readers are going to learn during the course of the book. There are also quotes from historical or anthropoligical works from that world at the beginning of chapters. A lot of thought went into the world-building. The chapters switch between the present and the past. While I do like the sense of layers of history that certain places and relationships have due to that I also feel that this narrative structure didn't quite work. A couple of times the timing is such that the emotional impact of places and events is lessened because we don't know of it, yet. I also wish we could have spent a bit more time with the grassland tribes in the beginning.