I Read Books: The Hawk Eternal

 

The Hawk Eternal

A sequel, or perhaps several sequels to Ironhand’s Daughter. Again we are in the Highlands, divided amongst clans, with no central authority. Caswallon sees the Lowlanders attacked by the Aenir, and rescues an orphan, adopting him. Teaching him we learn about the Highlands from the Oracle and also from Taliesen. The Aenir are scouting the Highlands.

So far so familiar. But this is a different Highlands, an alternative version. Taliesen is the last student of the creator of the gates, a star-and-time spanning civilisation that ended when the great gates closed. While the boys grow up, becoming young leaders and the Aenir close in on the Highlands, Caswallon must learn the secrets of the gates, and bring the future Queen Sigarni, from Ironhand’s Daughter, through to save them.

There are demons stalking the Highlands. The Aenir lord has lots of sons, each of which has an evil gimmick, which is good when they come to the games the summer before the invasion. The Aenir have been displaced in time and space through a gate, one generation ago – and it turns out the Highlanders were too, they’re the people Taliesen has been living with for more than a thousand years. He’s been looking through the possibility lines for the one world where they survive, where Sigarni wins. Sigarni needs Caswallon, who lives in another time, and Caswallon needs Sigarni, but the gates are failing.

The majority of the novel is classic Gemmel heroic fantasy. Once Caswallon gets caught up in the gates and the backstory he’s shuffled from time-and-place to time-and-place, doing what’s needed for the previous novel to work and to create a deus ex machina for this one – mostly just explaining how we get to an ending that we haven’t seen yet. Slightly disappointing conclusion to the duology, seeing Sigarni at the height of her power and at her end is not as interesting as might be hoped.

Read This: More Highland heroic fantasy adventures
Don’t Read This: The reveal of the gate backstory is not interesting in either content or how it’s written