- Paperback: 352 pages
- Publisher: Spectra (Nov 2 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 055337950X
- ISBN-13: 978-0553379501
- Product Dimensions: 23.2 x 15.4 x 2.4 cm
- Shipping Weight: 408 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #2,051,514 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
The Black Raven is Book Two of The Dragon Mage and the 10th volume of the Deverry series, a fantasy epic consisting of three interrelated quartets. As Katherine Kerr says, the past and the present are woven together in these novels, and the final volume will link with the first to reveal an overall design akin to a Celtic knot threading back and forth upon itself. This is a strange, pseudo-Celtic world in which reincarnation is a reality and past lives forever affect the present in surprising and unexpected ways. So, while The Black Raven can stand alone, it is advisable that readers begin with the first book, Daggerspell.
In this complex novel of civil war, sacrifice, and power, what impresses most is that Kerr uses an epic canvas to tell a strongly characterized and very human tale of hatred and destructive evil, and of the consequences of past malevolence on both the heroine Lilli and the Prince Maryn. By keeping the narrative tightly focused around a small number of characters, and by maintaining strict limits on the rather elaborately conceived elements of magic and the supernatural, Katherine Kerr ensures that her fantastical history does not overwhelm the more personal and affecting dimensions of the tale. The result is a polished, emotionally involving, and powerful novel in which even the dreams of a dragon may come evocatively to life. --Gary S. Dalkin, Amazon.co.uk
From Library Journal
Beleaguered by an ancient rival who has pursued him through countless lifetimes, Rhodry Maelwaedd struggles to preserve his land and his loved ones by any means necessary. In the distant past, the workings of the dweomer, which links one life to another through the centuries, plant the seeds that will come to fruition in Rhodry's time. Kerr's sequel to The Red Wyvern forms another part of her history of the land known as Deverry, a world ruled by fate and the cycles of reincarnation. A good selection for libraries owning previous series titles.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Duality, dweomer, detail...,
By Esther (Essex) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Black Raven: Book Two of the Dragon Mage (Mass Market Paperback)
This is the second book in the Dragon Mage series, which chronicles the fortunes of the inhabitants of Deverry and those of the Northlands and Westlands in various centuries.I found this sequel to The Red Wyvern slightly unsatisfying, but still an absolute charm of a novel, with the kind of detail a fantasy trainspotter like me thrives upon. Kerr does feudal villages and castles and fantasy/history exceedingly well; her characters are multidimensional and challenging - particularly the women, which I believe is deliberate: the men tend to be more distant - romantic figures or even caricatures - which I suppose might annoy you if you are a man. But this is quite unashamedly a book from a woman's point of view: for instance, when the men go to war the action of the novel tends to stay with the women left behind. This works very well indeed: it's not a feminist treatise, just an honest authorial perspective. In The Black Raven, we meet my favourite Lillorigga again, this time on the horns of a different dreadful dilemma, torn between her good, honest, loving, considerate, brave, strong, boring husband-to-be and the not altogether natural charisma and charms of the importunate Prince Maryn; working with dangerous magic to unravel a deadly curse on the Prince at the expense of her health and not entirely free of the spectre of her evil dead mother. But it's Niffa who takes my fancy in this one. Just coming into the awareness of her psychic abilities and hounded by Raena, the misguided sorceress with little conscience and too much power for her own - or anybody else's - good, Niffa mourns her murdered husband and is comforted by the family ferrets, unaware that her pain and persecution is a repetition of that of Lillorigga and her mother, doomed to continue, cycle upon cycle, in different incarnations, until, presumably, the battle between the supernatural forces which blights the lives of the inhabitants of Deverry and, centuries later, Cerr Cawnen, is resolved.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Raven Review,
By A.M Condie (Fayetteville, NC United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Black Raven: Book Two of the Dragon Mage (Mass Market Paperback)
As a fan of this Katharine Kerr series in its entirety I found this book to be a must read, and one that I could not put down. Her style of writing has remained as easy to read and all engrossing as when she first began the series. This last series though has tended to focus on fewer time-line scenarios than her previous books. While in after-thought I find this a little tedious (the book mainly revolving around the Llilorigga-Maryn, and Rhodry-Raena story-lines) you can tell that the story is coming to some grand conclusion which makes it worth the read!If you have read the series from the beginning it is a little disappointing compared to the excitement of the initial Daggerspell series, but we are still comparing greatness to not-so-exciting greatness! Its not a book to be read out of sequence, start with Daggerspell and from there you can't go wrong!
3.0 out of 5 stars
could be better,
This review is from: The Black Raven: Book Two of the Dragon Mage (Paperback)
This book was ok...but definitely not what she could really do. Compared ot Daggerspell, this one didn't really outshine the rest. As I read each one, it got better and better, therefore I expected this one to be the best so far. But the Red Wyvern was like the climax...I hope the rest of the books don't turn out to be like this one.
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