"When True Night Falls", C.S.Friedman

The first book of this fantasy trilogy was good but not great; this sequel still falls slightly short of 'great', but it is definitely better. I wasn't nearly so conscious of technical issues with the writing, and this volume turns out to focus directly on one of the things that had bothered me about its predecessor -- the fact that Damien supposedly serves a Church that bans the use of the fae to affect the planet, yet proceeded to spend the entire story doing just that, while the whole Church business, having been introduced at the start for local colour, was basically ignored as soon as it became inconvenient.

The entirety of "Black Sun Rising" was in effect a side-quest undertaken for motives that don't seem wholly adequate (and with various elements, like Tarrant starting to teach Ciani 'mechanical' sorcery to replace her lost inborn abilities, that don't seem to come to anything); in "True Night Falls" Damien the paladin is dealing with an actual threat to the Church he serves, even if he is doing so without the authority or permission of his superiors. And we get an insight into *why* the Church opposes the use of 'sorcery', not out of blind religious prejudice but for very practical reasons, and are given a vision of what can be achieved thereby... before Damien discovers at what cost.( Read more... )