The other lands

Review by Booklist Review

The middle book of Acacia plays out several years after the Mein were conquered despite loss of the Known World's ruler and his son and successor Aliver (see The War with the Mein, 2007) and protective exile of the remaining four royal children. Mena and Dariel have lived among the common people and want to end drug and slave trafficking. Their sister Corinn, who becomes queen, sees things very differently. She appoints trained warrior Mena to lead an army to slay voracious, nausea-evoking foulthings created by spells of corruption cast on natural creatures, and Dariel as an ambassador to the unknown Other Lands, charged with restoring the trade needed to restore the kingdom's stability. Betrayed and imprisoned, he faces possible death. Meanwhile, former slave Barad foments revolution, Corinn's devious covert agent has his own agenda, and the discovery of Aliver's nine-year-old out-of-wedlock daughter further roils the political waters. As before, intrigue and treachery run rampant, and Durham maintains the momentum as well as the twists and turns of the plot in an eminently satisfying manner.--Estes, Sally Copyright 2009 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

The power and originality of Durham's impressive fantasy debut, 2007's Acacia: The War with the Mein, isn't quite matched by this sequel, though it still features intelligent, well-crafted prose and complex characters. After a political assassination led to the overthrow of the Acacian Empire, the murdered king's children were split up and found very different destinies. The focus here is on the oldest, Corinn, now queen. She is a morally ambiguous figure, fiercely guarding her secrets of magic, willing to drug her subjects to stifle dissent and sacrifice her own siblings for power. Her depiction is the book's strength, as many of the other plot elements-betrayals, close brushes with death, terrifying monsters-are standard fare. Fans will still look for book three, but with diminished enthusiasm. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Library Journal Review

Raised by the man who ousted her father from the throne, Corinn has fought her way to the rulership of the Known World and now seeks to expand her territory. Her brother Dariel travels on an exploratory mission to the Other Lands, discovering a heretofore unknown threat to his home, while warrior sister Mena fights monsters for a queen she does not truly believe in. Durham continues the epic fantasy begun in Acacia: The War with the Mein. Verdict This should appeal especially to fans of large-scale, multigenerational epic fantasy in the style of George R.R. Martin and David Drake. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

Old wars are re-fought, new alliances and conflicts arise in the middle volume of a fantasy trilogy set in the embattled land that calls itself the Known World. Acacia (2007) chronicled the clouded history of an empire that delivers some of its children to slavery in "the Other Lands" in exchange for money and a drug that keeps Acacia's subjects quiescent. King Leodan's losing battle against multiple enemies forced him to send his four children toward safety in four different destinations. As this volume opens, the king's eldest daughter Corinn rules as his successor, having dispatched the northern chieftain who invaded Leodan's palace and (temporarily) won her love. Younger brother Aliver died in battle, but surviving siblings Dariel and Mena have become feared warriors, fighting the transfigured Santoth (exiled prophets who have shape-shifted alarmingly), the itinerant Lothan Aklun (slaves empowered by their takeover of the drug trade) and the opportunistic seagoing brigands of the League of Vessels. This dauntingly complicated and frequently puzzling narrative also includes the stories of such intriguing secondary characters as revolutionary leader Barad the Lesser; Corinn's Mr. Fixit assassin Delivegu; and an exiled, intuitively all-knowing beauty named Mor, of royal or perhaps even higher lineage. Moving into fantasy after three well received historical novels, Durham (Pride of Carthage, 2005, etc.) handles his many-leveled plot with impressive thoughtfulness; racial stereotyping, exploitation of defenseless populations and tribal enmity are among the subjects whose continued relevancefor the novel's characters and its readersbecomes increasingly evident. When Corinn, a superbly complex character quite wonderfully drawn, announces that "no more children of the Known Word will be sent to the Other Lands," it's an emancipation proclamation that may have come too late to avert what the closing pages suggest could become a global war. Desperately needs an annotated list of characters and a detailed glossary distinguishing various tribes and factions. But little else is missing from this ambitious work, which boggles the mind and transcends genre. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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Chapter One When the Balbara lookout shouted the alarm, Princess Mena Akaran was up from her campstool in an instant. She broke from the circle where she had been sitting with her officers and climbed the ridge at a run. She drew close to the sharp-eyed young man, sighting down his slim, brown arm and out from his pointing finger across the arid expanse that was central Talay. It took her a moment to see what he did. Even then, it was neither the creature itself she saw nor the party who hunted it. They were too far away. What marked their progress were the billows of smoke from the torches the runners carried--that and a yellow smudge at the rim of the world that must have been dust kicked up by their feet. They seemed to be as far off as the horizon, but the princess knew they would close that distance quickly. She half slid down the sandy slope and regrouped with her officers. One captain, Melio Sharratt, she assigned to the farthest southern beacon; to the other, Kelis of Umae, went the northern beacon. They already knew what to do, she told them. It was only a matter of seeing it accomplished, timing it perfectly, and having luck on their side. She left it to them to get the others in position and remind them of their instructions, but before she dismissed them she urged them both to act with caution. "Do you hear me?" she asked, leaning close to the small group. She took Melio by the wrist to remind him of this but did not look in his face. She knew his grin would hold constant, dismissive of the danger moving across the plain toward them. He may have become the head of the Elite, but the role had done nothing to alter him. His longish hair would be cast casually across an eye, often swept aside only to fall in place again. They had wed five years earlier. She had never hidden her love of him from others, but neither did she let it distract her at moments like this. She spoke as if her words were meant for all the hunting party, as, in truth, they were. "I want nobody dead. Only the foul thing dies today," she said. "Those words coming from you?" Melio asked. "Will you abide by them yourself, or will this be like last time, with that--" Mena spoke as if she had not heard him. "Nobody else. That order falls on each of you personally. We've lost too many already." Her eyes settled on Kelis. The Talayan's gaze was as calm as ever, his skin dark and smooth, his eyes slow moving. It was a face she had grown to deeply care for. In a strange way this Talayan was a living reminder of her eldest brother. Aliver had grown to manhood with him as his companion. Kelis had known her brother during the years that she had been separated from him. Even now, after all the evenings they had spent talking about what her brother had been like then, she still did not feel they had conversed enough. She hoped they would have many evenings more. She made a point of not meeting Melio's eyes as he moved away. If they were together again, whole, at the end of the day, she would show him just how much she felt for him with all her body. That was the way it had been with them lately: distant as they faced danger, enraptured with each other in the short reprieves afterward. The next half hour was a whirl of preparations. Moving among soldiers, shouting instructions, checking everything personally, Mena was as slim and leanly muscled and sun burnished as she had been during the war with Hanish Mein. She still wore the sword with which she had swum ashore on Vumu as a girl, but she was far from being that girl. Only an unobservant eye could fail to see that her lithe form contained within it a coiled energy hardened by loss, by war, and by an inner struggle with the deadly gifts that seemed to define her. There was love within her, too, but she kept that on a short tether. It was a softness that was difficult to spot within the Maeben fierceness she so often had to rely upon. Had she the time and the qu Excerpted from The Other Lands: Book Two of the Acacia Trilogy by David Anthony Durham All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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