Cursed Land [Hardcover]

Part of the reason I enjoyed this book so much was that McLaren ignored the mold of MTG books and developed her own original setting and rules. If the book didn't say MAGIC on the front, you wouldn't be able to tell it was based on the card game by reading it. Free of the constraints that writing a theme-based novel presents, this story was fun and exciting. The land of Cridhe was wonderfully vivid and the storyline progressed at a good pace, never becoming too slow, but still have enough meat to make the reader feel some attachment to the characters.

By assuming a certain amount of freedom in her writing content, and not really trying to get elements from the MTG card game into the novel, McLaren produced a better and more unique work. Just as the writers and artists for the cards themselves have the ability (and neccessity) of creating new creatures and places, authors of these books should be allowed to expand the world of Magic the Gathering. There shouldn't be any limitations on the possibilities of MTG.

Teri McLaren weaves a tapestry of incredible proportions before the readers' eyes in The Cursed Land. It's beyond words. Her book is a must-read - even for those who have never heard of Magic: the Gathering.

Sunshine wafts upon the villages with the opening. Teri's brilliant descriptions bring vitality and resplendence to what would normally be mundane. The author is also concise and unwasteful of words, even though her tale does not lose any flair or get too "skinny". By the end of the first chapter, the life force of the Island of Cridhe has been destroyed, a few people meet unfortunate fates, the stars have fallen and the earth has turned inside out...and yet the story is still amazingly coherent and pleasurable to read. In the space of a few words Teri can create a chasm the size of the Grand Canyon and a villain who makes all of those slimy bad guys from other books seem tame.

With her winding and sinuous story the author keeps the reader from falling over the rail. When you flip to the exhilarating ending (which is probably the best possible closing to the story there could be), you'll feel like you've been through a long journey...and you'll want to go back again.
The Cursed Land warrants repeated reading, for who can hear the deadly lullabies of the magical shrouds, view the shimmering acorn of the Clan Tree, and witness the equinox itself only once?

If you're familiar with Magic: the Gathering there's usually two kinds of books. There's the three book arcs that explore the newest plane described in the latest card set, and then there's stories set in and around Dominaria. This book is a one shot exploration of a place that has nothing to do with any of that. That really got me interested. It's a brand new unexplored plane filled with refrences to other planes (Ilcae, The Storm Lines, The Death Pools) and planeswalkers (Tempe, the Thorn, Platon, Krimon) you never hear anything about. No offense to giants like Urza and Nicol Bolas, but I really loved hearing about someone new for a change.

Not to mention the book itself is a good deal better than I was expecting. The setting is nicely fleshed out and filled with all sorts of fun fantasy creatures--giant carrion beetles called shield bugs that fight corpse collectors for bodies, big cat sized spiders that web found objects onto their backs for camoflage, shapechanging shrouds that can look like a blanket or sleeping bag and then devour you in your sleep, big eerie stalks of fungus that give off a shriek like a weeping girl when people stray too close--leading them out into bogs to drown and become nutrients. The locations are fun and distinctive: from Loch Prith the magical subterranian paradise of the elves--painted caves full of flowing springs, fireflies and magically sustained lush undergrowth; to the damp soot-covered streets of Inys Nohr where hack plagued peasants fish for eels in the murk and the buildings cling with mold and lichen; to misty Inys Haen where the people dress in colorfully woven bhanas and burn sod in thatched buildings to stave off the chill, surrounded by thorn gates--living through the same unchanging pattern generation after generation.

Plus I really enjoyed the politics--everyone's agendas and motives playing against everyone else's, some plans clicking together like clockwork while others just come completely unspooled in ways that were really fun to watch. Plus I have to say, there's something really touching about the way the story resolves--a real moral to it that comes off very genuine and not sanctimonious. Hard to do.

Anyway. I'm the sort of person who has a hard time picking up a book again once I've set it down. I've maybe finished a half-dozen books, the rest with long forgotten bookmarks stuck somewhere in the first third of them somewhere. I don't think I've ever gone through a book this fast. It took me just over three days. I never stick to a book like that.

So yeah, big recommendation.

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