The Shadow of the Torturer

By: Gene Wolfe

Write A Review

Hardcover | 7 February 1991

Sorry, we are not able to source the book you are looking for right now.

We did a search for other books with a similar title, however there were no matches. You can try selecting from a similar category, click on the author's name, or use the search box above to find your book.

The first volume of "The Book of the New Sun". The Earth is old and the sun is dying. In the great Citadel of the City Imperishable, Severian - apprentice to the torturer's guild - betrays his oath. Exiled, he begins his phantasmagoric odyssey through the perilous world of the deep, distant future.

Industry Reviews

The first volume of a projected tetralogy set on a wintry post-technological Earth beneath a dying sun. Under a strictly maintained oligarchy whose precise nature is never very clear, various ancient guilds in an immense "Citadel" somewhere in the erstwhile South America piously attend the still-functioning machines of a legendary interstellar civilization. The apprentice Severian of the Torturers' Guild, exiled for helping a noble prisoner to kill herself before the completion of her sentence, is setting out for a new appointment in a distant city when the mysterious sword he carries precipitates him into a duel waged with poisonous extraterrestrial weapons; at the same time he comes into possession of a strange jewel (to be the subject of the second book). Wolfe, who has seldom failed to tell a good story with tantalizing intelligence, is in characteristic form here, investing banal materials with elliptical intimations of portent; but somehow this vein seems hollower in a long narrative than in his many splendid short stories and novellas. The whole series may turn out to be only another quest-story got up with metaphysical trappings; this first installment, however, certainly has its strengths - and we'll hope for the best. (Kirkus Reviews)

Shipping

	Standard Shipping	Express Shipping
Metro postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95
Regional postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95
Rural postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95

Orders over $79.00 qualify for free shipping.

How to return your order

At Booktopia, we offer hassle-free returns in accordance with our returns policy. If you wish to return an item, please get in touch with Booktopia Customer Care.

Additional postage charges may be applicable.