Another Much Needed Original Contribution to Fantasy By Donaldson
In the sea of mediocrity that is the fantasy genre, it’s great to have Donaldson around. Like the Covenant series, Mordant’s Need is that rarest of things in the genre; a bonafide original premise. Unlike the last few fantasy tales I read before this one (by other authors), I did not feel the imposing influence of Tolkien in “The Mirror of Her Dreams.” What’s more, it’s not a quest plot, has no immediately recognizable Dark Lord, stars an anti-hero female, and is more of a mystery than an epic. The innovative premise is the magic called Imagery, which is really the only thing that places the book in the fantasy genre; without it the story would be more akin to historical fiction because the world in which Mordant is located is very similar to our own Dark Ages. Imagery is an entirely new take on magic which fans of the truly imaginative will appreciate fully.
Donaldson proves with this one that he is as capable of intertwining plots, foreshadowing, and suspense as the bestsellers in the mystery and thriller genres. This is truly a rarity in the fantasy genre, where plots are often regurgitated excuses for action, elves, dragons, and orcs.
Donaldson does a great job of describing Terisa’s battle against her attraction for the bad boy, Eremis, and gets the reader invested in the book superbly by having her always on the brink of falling into his trap. In a sense her supposed naivette is what makes her somewhat of an anti-hero (not as extreme as Covenant of course but still an anti-hero, at least in the beginning), but it is also her inability to take action and responsibility (due to her sheltered upbringing). But unlike Covenant, Terisa is much more acceptable to the sensibilities of most people and the changes in character she undergoes are much more profound and recognizeable.
I have read in other reviews that Donaldson’s overuse of obscure/complex words made this book burdonsome, but I couldn’t disagree more; in this one Donaldson strikes a perfect balance, being a bit more challenging than your average rot but not as challenging as the somewhat cumbersome Covenant series. If you think this one is too verbose, you missed too many spelling lessons or have a stronger than average aversion to dictionaries. Sure it’s got some new words, but not too many, and we NEED to learn new words every once and a while. What I don’t like so much about this book is that Donaldson seems to have taken on more of the slick, commercial style that most fantasy and popular fiction writers swear by today-i.e.- pacing is EVERYTHING, overuse the humor, pile on the romance, overdo the character development. The Covenant series FELT older, more arcane, but wasn’t a carbon copy of Tolkien’s style. I missed that in this book, because I’m still yearning for fantasy books that make themselves FEEL authentic by not dripping with modern style.
Like The Covenant series, this one does start out slow. But here the pay-off is excellent. The background and set-up create a wonderful suspension of disbelief which sets the writing high above the heads of other bestselling fantasy novelists. The build-up creates a page-turning obsession once it’s gotten a grip on you, and you are delightful wondering what’s going on through the majority of the book. It’s good to see post-modernism being applied to sword and sorcery.
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