Age of Assassins

The book is a single perspective, first person novel, something that doesn’t usually score too highly for me. I say usually because my two favourite fantasy book series of all time are exactly that, but usually I like a whole roster of different character perspectives to give opposing view points and different voices. This book could have done with that, or at least it could have in my humble opinion. That said, that’s just me nit picking, as I still think this book was a good read (or listen, but you know what I mean).

I jumped straight from one fantasy series about assassins to another, but the feel of Age of Assassins couldn’t be more different to King’s Dark Tidings. It’s less of the classical romp across the land and far more concentrated on the character of Girton Club-Foot, out protagonist. Now the book may have been lacking in several areas, of which I will speak on shortly, but the one thing that you can’t say R.J. Barker failed at was creating a believable and genuine character in Girton. He’s a fifteen-year-old cripple who was bought as a child from a slave auction and trained by the best assassin in the land. He isn’t some evil bringer of death. He’s a teenage boy who, along with his master, is forced into a situation that neither can escape. The book is far more a murder mystery set in a land of sword, politicking, and forbidden magic, and if that’s the kind of book you like, then this is certainly the book for you. However, I personally like a bit more action/adventure in my novels.

It’s slow paced, very slow at times, but it needs to be to build what it’s trying to achieve. However, what it’s trying to achieve just wasn’t something that caught me. I couldn’t fault the writing style, couldn’t fault the characters, couldn’t really fault anything other than that it just wasn’t the book I had hoped it would be. It doesn’t give anything away to say that the book is almost set entirely in the single castle that it starts in. Barker goes to great length to create a bleak, desolate, and incredibly interesting world, but then shuts us out by confining our protagonist to a single fortress and the area immediately around it. That, in my opinion, is a terrible waste. I wanted to see more of the world of The Wounded Kingdom than could be gleaned from peering over the battlements, but that in of itself does add to the stark and grim world within which our story takes place. Again, I can’t fault that author for doing it.

The book is gripping at times, and Barker weaves a complex story of backstabbing and betrayal all through the eyes of a lonely teenager who is just trying to help his master in a task that is forced upon her. What the book does, it does very well. The few actions scenes that are present are well paced and realistic, and the style of quoting the names of the sword-forms paints a damned vivid picture in the mind, albeit a dreary and melancholy picture. The world within which Girton lives has little if any joy in it, but that makes what joy he finds all the sweeter to taste and bitter to lose. Like I said, it is very well written, and if it wasn’t, I don’t know as I would have stuck with it to the end. I’m a simple man who likes simple things: original and vibrant backdrops, pithy wit and crude humour, and happenings that are fantastical yet used in realistic manners. These were all things that tended to be missing in this book, but what was there was done beautifully.

So, if you like deep personal stories that concentrate far more on a single character than a group or the journey itself, this is very much a book for you. Unfortunately, that’s just not what I crave in my crippling addiction for a new fantasy fix. It was good enough for me to spend the Audible credit to buy the sequel though, and I’m very glad that I did. But that’s a story for the next review.

As for the narration quality, the accents were perfect, the voices distinctive, and the slow-burn of emotion that defined this book were sumptuously smouldering. Joe Jameson gets top marks.

Personal rating: 3.75 stars.    

Professional rating: 4.0 stars.