Hardcover, 432 pages
Published May 30, 2023 by Tordotcom.
What a beginning. Unfortunately, the rest doesn’t quite gel. A standalone fantasy novel that throws you into its world building without any handholding. There’s a way to do this that’s successful, and normally Wells has no problem with it. Not here. The things she focused on were not what I wanted to read more about. Kinda frustrating!
Content warning Mention to certain parts of the plot (not big big spoilers)
As much as I love Martha Wells' work, I didn't fall in love with this book, not just at the beginning, but along it either. There is in this story a love for killing people to solve problems that didn't sit well with me. The main character, Kai (not Kai-Enna, who is only one of the impersonations of him) feels a bit plain, not nuanced. I kept thinking he didn't have a personality. He just... acts. He is not a bad person but he goes around just killing people. The magic also felt kind of inconsistent and random to me. Nothing gets well explained, and things that can and cannot be done are just "there" for no apparent reason. The characters in general are archetypes, not particularly deep or well designed... If you compare these characters to the Raksura ones, there is a world of difference. I don't know, it just felt... shallow.
Habe das (Hör-)Buch bei 12% abgebrochen. So der ich Murderbot Diaries mag, so sehr hat mich Witch Kind gelangweilt. Ich konnte zu keinem Charakter eine Verbindung aufbauen und das ist eine schlechte Grundlage um einer so komplexen Story akustisch zu folgen. Das Hörbuch begann tatsächlich mit einer mehr als drei Minuten andauernden Aufzählung von absurd vielen Charakteren, von denen viele noch Spitznamen hatten und in Beziehung zu anderen Charakteren standen,… Natürlich konnte ich dem nicht folgen, ich kannte ja noch nicht mal einen der Charas. Kein guter Start.
Der Rest der 12%, die ich gehört habe, unterschied sich allein in einem Aspekt positiv von 0815-Fantasy: Das Setting war nicht irgendwo im europäischen Mittelalter. Vielmehr zogen die Personen umher, waren vielleicht Beduinen oder ähnliche nicht-sesshafte Gruppen.
Aber alles andere war so langweilig: Hauptcharakter männlich (wenn auch nicht hetero), „the chosen one“ (wenn auch Dämon), rechtschaffend-gut obwohl Dämon, … und was mich …
Habe das (Hör-)Buch bei 12% abgebrochen. So der ich Murderbot Diaries mag, so sehr hat mich Witch Kind gelangweilt. Ich konnte zu keinem Charakter eine Verbindung aufbauen und das ist eine schlechte Grundlage um einer so komplexen Story akustisch zu folgen. Das Hörbuch begann tatsächlich mit einer mehr als drei Minuten andauernden Aufzählung von absurd vielen Charakteren, von denen viele noch Spitznamen hatten und in Beziehung zu anderen Charakteren standen,… Natürlich konnte ich dem nicht folgen, ich kannte ja noch nicht mal einen der Charas. Kein guter Start.
Der Rest der 12%, die ich gehört habe, unterschied sich allein in einem Aspekt positiv von 0815-Fantasy: Das Setting war nicht irgendwo im europäischen Mittelalter. Vielmehr zogen die Personen umher, waren vielleicht Beduinen oder ähnliche nicht-sesshafte Gruppen.
Aber alles andere war so langweilig: Hauptcharakter männlich (wenn auch nicht hetero), „the chosen one“ (wenn auch Dämon), rechtschaffend-gut obwohl Dämon, … und was mich immer besonders irkt: Natürlich haben die wichtigen Leute alle Bedienstete-bis-Sklaven, die möglicherweise durch weniger-reinblütig-sein an diesen Platz kamen… Urgh.
Das ist mit alles zu monarchistisch, da höre ich lieber ein paar langweilige, heteronormative Grusel-Hörspiele bis das nächste Murderbot-Hörbuch in der Bücherei verfügbar ist.
This one is difficult to rate for me. I only had 7 days to read it but it's a book that needs to be savoured. You should take your time with it. So I probably didn't get the full experience. The narrative starts right in the middle of a story that has a long backstory some of which the readers are going to learn during the course of the book. There are also quotes from historical or anthropoligical works from that world at the beginning of chapters. A lot of thought went into the world-building. The chapters switch between the present and the past. While I do like the sense of layers of history that certain places and relationships have due to that I also feel that this narrative structure didn't quite work. A couple of times the timing is such that the emotional impact of places and events is …
This one is difficult to rate for me. I only had 7 days to read it but it's a book that needs to be savoured. You should take your time with it. So I probably didn't get the full experience. The narrative starts right in the middle of a story that has a long backstory some of which the readers are going to learn during the course of the book. There are also quotes from historical or anthropoligical works from that world at the beginning of chapters. A lot of thought went into the world-building. The chapters switch between the present and the past. While I do like the sense of layers of history that certain places and relationships have due to that I also feel that this narrative structure didn't quite work. A couple of times the timing is such that the emotional impact of places and events is lessened because we don't know of it, yet. I also wish we could have spent a bit more time with the grassland tribes in the beginning.
“I'm so angry, I could burn the world." "Unfortunately, someone else has already burned it. We need to unburn it."
Martha Wells remains undefeated .
In one sense, it was like Lord of the Rings in that by the time you got to the end of the book, you have a fairly good idea on the histories and hierarchies of the different people groups, but there's still so much more to explore. Left wanting more.
What was definitely different from LOTR is the quality of the characters and their relationships. Overall, a great time.
I adored how wide the world felt and how much was hinted at by the various, subtly interacting magic systems at play. I feel like there are so many nooks and crannies to be explored around the main storyline of this book that it feels like a nearly inexhaustible mine. More, please!
The narrative structure jumps from the present to the past, each giving context to the other and its people -- literally showing you why the characters act the way they do, showing how the current situation came to be, giving you a real sense of time and consequence. I loved it.
And, as I've come to expect from Martha Wells, her depictions of trauma responses feel on-point and real. How everyone reacts to their own ghastly experiences and how it drives them are on full display and are very sympathetic.
So: great world-building. Fun characters and relationships. A …
I adored how wide the world felt and how much was hinted at by the various, subtly interacting magic systems at play. I feel like there are so many nooks and crannies to be explored around the main storyline of this book that it feels like a nearly inexhaustible mine. More, please!
The narrative structure jumps from the present to the past, each giving context to the other and its people -- literally showing you why the characters act the way they do, showing how the current situation came to be, giving you a real sense of time and consequence. I loved it.
And, as I've come to expect from Martha Wells, her depictions of trauma responses feel on-point and real. How everyone reacts to their own ghastly experiences and how it drives them are on full display and are very sympathetic.
So: great world-building. Fun characters and relationships. A complex, political story with very "human" characters. It drops you in to a rushing river and expects you to swim, which I love.
That said, I feel like the characters besides Kai, the main POV, are a little flat. There's a chance that they feel that way because of how much Kai is struggling with their own inner demons (heh heh); maybe Kai's inward focus makes them somewhat blind to others' personalities and the narrative reflects that?
A fun, fast-moving fantasy story in an interesting world and compelling characters. I would have loved a little bit deeper character development to get up to that fifth star.
This was a very nice read and astonishingly complex world building for a single volume. My main issue with the book was that I needed the first half to figure out what was going on and then spent the second half to remember all the intricate details of the world Martha Wells created. I would definitely read another book from the same universe.
Overall, this was a decent book, though I approached it with expectations that were unreasonably high. On it's own, it's an interesting story and sets the stage for an interesting setting that could lead to further adventures. It does feel like you're coming in right in between the action so I felt a little lost as to what was possible and who the characters were, which I think is my biggest problem with the book- there is a lot to absorb, but we're only given tidbits in the interest of keeping the plot moving.
For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2023/06/book-review-witch-king-by-martha-wells.html
This book is the tale of Kai (a demon prince) who had been trapped with his witch friend Ziede, working to figure out who had trapped them and why, while also trying to rescue their missing friend Tahren. There's also a perspective of Kai from the past being trapped, freed, and working to fight against the Hierarchs.
I have some mixed feelings about this book. It certainly opens up very strongly and the characters, plot, and world grabbed me immediately. I am a sucker for a story with dual perspective, telling a story in the past as well as the present that echo each other. The worldbuilding ideas felt super fresh and I loved learning about the world, the politics, and the characters. However, I was disappointed by parts of the ending, felt overwhelmed by a lot of world detail for quite some time, and wished that there was a …
This book is the tale of Kai (a demon prince) who had been trapped with his witch friend Ziede, working to figure out who had trapped them and why, while also trying to rescue their missing friend Tahren. There's also a perspective of Kai from the past being trapped, freed, and working to fight against the Hierarchs.
I have some mixed feelings about this book. It certainly opens up very strongly and the characters, plot, and world grabbed me immediately. I am a sucker for a story with dual perspective, telling a story in the past as well as the present that echo each other. The worldbuilding ideas felt super fresh and I loved learning about the world, the politics, and the characters. However, I was disappointed by parts of the ending, felt overwhelmed by a lot of world detail for quite some time, and wished that there was a bit more character detail for anybody but Kai.
This book drops you squarely in the middle of worldbuilding detail (almost as much as Ninefox Gambit). Even by the end, I'm still not sure that I know what differentiates various magic types, what the Hierarchs are, or the different flavors of Immortal Blessed. I don't know that I need to know all of these things either, but it felt like I was left with a lot of holes in my knowledge.
Because of that, I hope that there is more than just this single book, because so much of it leaves me wanting. There's whole swaths of history that are not described in the past (e.g. Kai's grandmother) as well as between the past and present sections of the narrative. On top of that, it felt like there were some characters like Tenes and Sanja who didn't really get a lot of space on the page. It almost felt like the cast was too broad and so characters didn't get enough room to develop.
I certainly dig the gender stuff going on in the background. Kai is a demon who inhabits multiple bodies over time. There's also some snooty "oh these Arike folks have some binary gender hangups" in an epigraph before some of the chapters. There's some comments about mercenaries (normally women) being forced to present in ways that they normally wouldn't. This is all kind of in the background of the story, but mostly I just want to hear more about demon gender, thank you.
I think my biggest disappointment with the book is the method in which some of the plot lines are wrapped up. I'll leave those thoughts in a spoilerly comment separately: books.theunseen.city/user/picklish/comment/81523#anchor-81523
Despite some negative feelings above, overall I really enjoyed this and it makes me want to go back and reread the Raksura books again.
