The Keeper's Tattoo [Hardcover]

The Keepers' Tattoo, previously published as The Keepers' Daughter in the U.K., is a young adult high fantasy with historical overtones. While it is set in an imaginary world, the story revolves around the earthquake-ruined city of Thira and the highly advanced "Keepers" who once lived there. Gill Arbuthnott is clearly drawing on the real-life Thera and the mysterious Minoan culture that may have inspired the legends of Atlantis. I've long been fascinated by all things Minoan, and so I loved this aspect of the novel.

As The Keepers' Tattoo begins, young Nyssa is living an ordinary existence as a cook in her adoptive father's tavern. Then, the Shadowmen -- sinister henchmen of the tyrant Alaric -- arrive in her small town, and Nyssa is quickly hustled away by Marius, an uncle she never knew she had. Marius tells Nyssa that she is being hunted for a tattoo she bears on the back of her head, which makes up half of a powerful spell. The other half was tattooed on her dead twin brother, Kit.

Nyssa and Marius seek only safety at first, but when Nyssa learns that her brother is in fact alive and a prisoner in Alaric's palace, their flight becomes a quest to rescue him. They are joined by Nyssa's friend Aria, a lady of the evening. (Note to Worried Parents: Aria's profession is very subtly drawn and never practiced "onscreen.") It will be nearly impossible to spirit Kit away from Alaric, and if they succeed, they will be fugitives again, hunted at every turn.

The characters remain a little distant throughout, and the prose is a mixed bag. Sometimes it's workmanlike and plagued by frequent head-hopping. Sometimes it's haunting, especially in its descriptions of Thira:

"It was smaller than Nyssa had expected, but then half of it was in the sea. It seemed to melt into the water. The tide was out, exposing weed-swagged columns and fragments of walls, roofs of faded terra-cotta with gaping holes like open mouths, the remains of houses, shops, temples -- all sorts of buildings.

A broad slipway of dressed stone, fraying now at the edges, led down into the blue water. As she looked at it, Nyssa realized it must have once been a processional way, leading down to a great temple whose column caps and shattered roof she could just glimpse breaking the waves, the farthest out of any of the visible drowned buildings.

Everywhere there were remnants of the great city that Thira had once been, but now it was a shadow and a memory: a ghost of its past."

The Keepers' Tattoo is a long novel, and drags a little in places. There are several factors at work here. One is, I'll admit, a personal issue of mine. I've never been much for a particular plot structure common in quest fantasy. This is the plot structure where characters travel to a town, escape some kind of danger there, travel to the next town, escape danger there, and so on. I know there are readers who like it, but it always starts feeling like D&D to me. Then there are the Alaric chapters. Many of these could have been shortened or removed without losing much from the plot. Mostly they tell us things we already know. The main narrative will tell or imply something, then we cut to Alaric sitting in his lair thinking about the same thing. I can't speak for young adult readers, but to an adult reader these scenes feel a little like padding and a little like spoon-feeding.

However, The Keepers' Tattoo is admirable for its vivid setting and complex history, and unusual in that it's self-contained (no sequel bait here) and not focused on romance. In fact, Nyssa doesn't even have a romance. (There is an understated romance between two other characters.) Depending on your tastes, this may be a good thing or a bad thing, but it's definitely a different thing. This is not a book that will spark any "Team This Guy" vs. "Team That Guy" wars!

Nyssa lives a life like any other teenage orphan in the Archipelago - she works slugging beers and cooking for her room and board. She tries to imagine what her past could be and also to understand the many strange dreams she has had since she was a child. Nothing and no one is left to tell her, except for one piece of history - the small crane tattooed on her upper forearm. One day while at the docks, a dark, foreboding ship is seen sailing into the harbor. Nyssa thinks nothing of it until that night, when a man named Marius, a familiar regular at her bar, ushers her and the barkeep aside, and her life forever changes.

The ship is of the Shadowmen and their leader, Alaric from Thira, the old, powerful capital of the Archipelago. Alaric and his Shadowmen are known to have taken over the islands of the Archipelago years ago and killed off people from the clan known as The Keepers. The Keepers seemed magical in the vast amount of knowledge they passed on from one Keeper to the next. No one believes they exist except in Legend. All except Marius and William, who show Nyssa their matching crane tattoos and tell her she, too, is a Keeper - and that the Shadowmen are looking for her!

Marius takes her away from the Drowned Boy bar and on the run to escape notice and capture by the Shadowmen. Nyssa's past and the secrets of her tattoo begin to reveal themselves. She slowly begins to piece together her life in connection with the Keeper's Legend. She is one of the twins from the Legend, a twin who has three lines of script tattooed on the back of her head, half of a powerful verse that once saved the Archipelago from the Shadowmen. Half of a verse, one of two twins ...suddenly Nyssa understands the visions she has seen for years. She has been seeing the life of her twin, Kit, who was captured by Alaric long ago and forced into slavery. Determined to save him, Nyssa will do anything to get to Thira with or without Marius's help. And she just might save the Archipelago from Alaric and the Shadowmen, too, if she can avoid capture and death along the way.

Arbuthnott has written a realistic fantasy/adventure novel with an artistic, literary prose. Though a fast read, there are still challenging concepts lightly and thoughtfully touched upon. Who tells history? And what is the power of history over legend? Is there a difference?

Fans of THE HUNGER GAMES, WINGS, AND INCARCERON will find similar styles of intrigue, surprise, and cliff-hanging chapter endings that make this 400+ page book seem like the shortest and most thrilling adventure to read.

Reviewed by: Erikka Adams, aka "The Bookbinder"

The Keepers' Tattoo by Gill Arbuthnott is riveting with its suspense and intrigue. We meet Nyssa, a cheerful and sweet 15-year-old who is a cook and a tavern maid in a medieval-like world. As with many low-caste orphans in fantasy novels, she has a secret identity, hinted at by the mysterious tattoo on the back of her head. The tattoo itself is half of an inscription in a now-forgotten language of the Keepers, a civilization that was based on science and reason.

Nyssa also has nightmares that are so vivid she can't help but feel "as though she has lived someone else's life, or at least glimpsed it." Who was she? Where did she come from? When the terrifying Shadowmen arrive and seem to be chasing just her, she discovers her uncle Marius and a dance hall girl named Aria are the ones who can help her. Further discoveries include a unknown twin brother, horrible abuse, and a dictator who is trying to build an empire, which only puts them on the run again.

Can they translate the tattoos that mark them before the dictator and his Shadowmen catch them? Can they save themselves? Can they help others? Nyssa's fierce independence makes this a great read. One can't help but root for these survivors, especially with all the twists and turns in the story. More than that, this is a story about the power of love being able to heal.

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