The Standing Dead

The second instalment in The Stone Dance of the Chameleon fantasy trilogy picks up from the cliffhanging end to The Chosen, with the Ruling Lord Suth desperately searching within the sacred walls of Osrakum for his son Carnelian and his lover Osidian, the God Emperor elect. He fears the Empress Ykoriana's deadly hand is behind their disappearance and if they are not found soon, it is her other son Malachite who will rule with dire consequences for the Three Lands. Carnelian and Osidian have broken free from Ykoriana's grip, but after a nightmarish journey sealed in the urns in which they were to be buried alive, they find themselves captives among one of the barbarian tribes of the Earthsky. Carnelian readily succumbs to the seasonal rhythm of tribal life and when he discovers that his childhood nursemaid was taken as a slave from the Ochre tribe, he is convinced that fate has brought him to them. He grows to love the simple people and their ways, hoping for sanctuary among them. As they lives with the plainsmen they witness the horrific cruelty and oppression that the Masters, or the Standing Dead as the tribesmen call his kind, have inflicted on them for millennia. But far from the experience softening him, Osidian's lust for revenge merely grows deeper and the dark forces that Carnelian helped unleash in Osrakum threaten the tribe's very existence. The vivid detail of storytelling is stunning. Rather than epic battles and heroic adventures, there is an immensely detailed hierarchical social system and intense relationships between deeply drawn characters, whose feelings and emotions pour out through the story. The systematic cruelty of the society, seen through the eyes of the elite Masters in The Chosen and now through the oppressed plainsmen, quickens your heartbeat and curls your toes. The detail drags the pace at times, but you cannot help but get embroiled in the lives of the characters so the effort is well rewarded. A sophisticated and imaginative fantasy that is well worth reading from the beginning. (Kirkus UK)