Saturday, July 2, 2011

Stormlord’s Exile-Glenda Larke

Stormlord’s Exile
Glenda Larke
Orbit, Aug 1 2011, $7.99
ISBN: 9780316069137

In Quartern, Shale has succeeded for now in save his people, but achieved the mission partly because Terelle secretly enhanced his skills with her foreign enigmatic magic (see The Stormlord Rising). However, his job is not done as he must supply the water needed by a parched people to survive. The Quartern hierarchy resent this newcomer’s sudden rise to the top as the highlords and the waterpriests prefer the people die from a lack of water than see him rise to Stormlord.

The Reduner who thirsts for revenge go after him but with Terelle having his back, defeated them. When Terelle feels the compulsion to cross the desert to go home to fulfill the final episode of the waterpaintings prophecy, Shale fears going alone; but she leaves him enough waterpaintings to keep the land wet until she returns to be with her beloved Shale; that is if they survive the separate assaults on them.

The final Stormlord fantasy is a terrific finish to a strong saga. The couple is strong separately as each has grown since their initial encounters in The Last Stormlord, but much more powerful as a cohesive unit. Loaded with action, readers will relish the politics of water in the Larke realm as some choose deadly drought to maintain or increase their power.

Harriet Klausner

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