Robbie & de Kruiper - Raymond E. Feist

In May last year Magician's End, the final book in Feist's long running Riftwar series, appeared. It was the final chapter in a series that had been going for over thirty years. Earlier that year, Feist published the novella Jimmy and the Crawler to tie up a loose end in the series. As usual with Feist, I read it in Dutch translation. One of the earlier translators of Feist's works, I think translator Mat Schifferstein is the fourth to have a go at Riftwar material, has decided to rename the character Jimmy the Hand, hence the Dutch title Robbie & de Kruiper.

This novella is part of the Riftwar Legacy subseries, which is tied to the PC games Betrayal at Krondor (1993) and Return to Krondor (1998) which are based on Feist's Midkemian setting. Three full novels have appeared in this series, two of which are novelizations of the RPG storylines in the computer games. Originally two more full length novels were planned, with working titles Krondor: The Crawler and Krondor: The Dark Mage. Due to a conflict wit Sierra, the developer of the computer games, these novels were never written. Feist has alluded to events taking places in these novels in several places in his other books, leaving an obvious hole in the series. It seems clear now that the novels will never be written but this novella does attempt to tie up the dangling story lines.

Jimmy and the Crawler is set some time after Krondor: Tear of the Gods. The precious artefact has been recovered but the mysterious Crawler still hasn't been taken out. Arutha, Prince of Krondor, is worried about this threat and puts his thief-come-nobleman Jimmy the Hand on the case with. To make sure he lives though the assignment he is accompanied by William, soldier and son of Pug the Magician and court magician Jazhara with him. The trail leads to Durbin, a port city nominally part of the empire of Great Kesh and notorious for the slave trade and pirating that goes on in the city. Jimmy soon reaches the conclusion that everything they thought they knew about the Crawler is incorrect.

The Riftwar Legacy series features some of the poorest novels in the entire Riftwar cycle. Most of them read like a poorly worked out scenario for a role playing game, with a strong emphasis on action at very little room for such things as characterization and overarching story lines. I guess, given their origins as RPG computer games it is not entirely surprising but they still disappointed me at the time. Jimmy and the Crawler doesn't really escape this. Feist is obviously in a hurry to finish an constantly refers to earlier books to keep from having to elaborate too much. I have a feeling that some continuity errors creep up in this book as well. Since the later books are riddled with them, it shouldn't bother the reader who has stuck with Feist for this long too much though.

Feist usually uses multiple points of view to tell his story, enabling him to depict events at several locations and tell the story from the mundane level al the way up to the gods. This novella focuses entirely on Jimmy's exploits. His point of view is dominant. Feist switches once or twice when he needs to depict events taking place outside Jimmy's line of sight but for the most part we stick with him. The multi-layered approach is entirely sacrificed. It results in a very straightforward tale with a rather high dungeons and dragons level.

It doesn't help that to the reader who has already completed most of the other books in the series, what needs to happen in this story is obvious. There is very little surprise in it. To make matters worse Feist reuses one of the more important plot devices in the first book of the Darkwar Saga, Flight of the Nighthawks (2005). He attempts some twists and turns but nothing the experienced Feist reader hasn't seen before. With all the references to other books it's is not a good place to start the series either.

In the end, Jimmy and the Crawler feels like a novella Feist felt he owed his readers but was not particularly inspired to write. While I could enjoy and appreciate Magician's End at some level, this work reminded me again why I was so disappointed by the earlier Krondor books. It's so straightforward, hasty and uninspired that only the completist will want to read it. Maybe with a bit more fleshed out plot it could have been a worthwhile addition but as it is, it achieves nothing other than plugging a plot hole.

Book Details
Title: Robbie & de Kruiper
Author: Raymond E. Feist
Publisher: Luithingh Fantasy
Pages: 155
Year: 2013
Language: Dutch
Translation: Mat Schifferstein
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-90-245-6288-6
First published: 2013

Het einde van de Magier - Raymond E. Feist

Otherwise known as Magician's End. When I was in my late teens I went through a spell when I hardly read any books at all. Literature classes at the time seemed to be aimed to force the most boring reading material on you, or otherwise books that are way over the head of your average teenagers, making reading seriously unappealing. I've always wondered how many people never got back to reading again after going through those classes. I returned to reading in 1996 when I entered college, mostly to take my mind off the more technical stuff I had to read as part of my education. Feist's novels had first started appearing in Dutch translation back then and he is in part responsible for my reading habits these days.

Feist was quickly followed by other big names in Fantasy and Science Fiction. I didn't take me that long to figure out he isn't a very good writer in most respects. What he used to be very good at was hold the reader's attention though. Even if his stories are straight, fairly stereotypical D&D material, there is something in there that keeps you reading. In the late 1999s my access to English language books was limited so I ended up with a whole stack of Feist's novels in translation. He is one of the few authors I never read in English. In hindsight, maybe I should have. the translation contains some annoying inconsistencies, especially in the names of characters. Then again, I suspect Feist's prose isn't the kind that looses anything in translation.

Magician's End is the final part in Feist's riftwar cycle, a series of books that started with the publication of Magician in 1982. As of 2013 there are 29 novels in the series, one novella and several shorter pieces. Apart from the novella, Jimmy and the Crawler, in with Feist tries to salvage the last two projected volumes in the Krondor sub series, I've read them all. Personally I think that Feist hasn't really produced anything decent since the third volume of the Sertpentwar Saga: Rage of a Demon King. Most of the work he produced after 1998 has been sloppy, riddled with continuity errors and frequently feels rushed. I seriously considered dropping the series at one point but by then, he had almost reached the end of the cycle. And it must be said, while his most recent books aren't his best, they have been a step up from the real low he hit in the early 2000s.

Magician's End is the final volume in the cycle. Meant to tie up all loose ends in the series. Pug and his companions are are faced with the ultimate threat to their world, while on the mortal plane, Feist rehashes the plot of Magician and presents us with another difficult succession in the Kingdom of the Isles. Feist among other things resolves the prophecy where Pug has to see everyone he cares for die before his work is done and reveals another layer in the cosmology of Midkemia.

Over the course of the series the cosmology of the Midkemian universe has been revised and added to several times. Marcos in particular has revised his truth so often that nothing he says can be take without a grain of salt anymore. In this novel, Feist expands his analogy between quantum mechanics and magic. It is something that has come up a number of times before, Nakor's view on magic is particularly compatible with quantum mechanics, but I don't Feist has gone into it in so much detail before. It is almost like he is agreeing with Arthur C. Clarke on technology and magic. Of course I don't think I know anyone able to manipulate matter at the quantum level with their mind. When you think about it, the Midkemian universe has an interesting structure to it. Unfortunately the way it is presented in the novels is mostly to serve the story. When Feist needs the rules changed or an even more dangerous enemy introduced, he adds another layer.

While the magical side of the story was decent, I really can't say the same for the events in the Kingdom of the Isles. As usual, the sword part of Feist's sword and sorcery is some kind of boyish wishfulfilment. He rarely includes female characters that are more than the love interest of whatever boy happens to be the main character (a notable exception being Mara, the main character in the Empire trilogy co-authored by Janny Wurts, these are some of the best books in the cycle). The victor of the war of succession is never in much doubt and he observant reader will probably have guessed to outcome in the previous book already. The whole plot line and characters involved are predictable and cliché to say the least. There doesn't seem to be much of a connection between the events in the Kingdom and the magical struggle that Pug and his companions are facing either. The outcome of the war is essentially irrelevant to whether or not the universe Midkemia is part of can be saved.

Feist's work displays a lot of problematic elements that were common in the sprawling fantasies of the 1980s and 1990s. These works have a certain appeal but in recent years I have drifted away from it a little. The overused pseudo medieval settings, feudal societies, the messiah-like prophecized one, the stereotypical elves, dwarves and dragons, the traditional roles of men and women, the problematic borrowing of non-western cultural practices to represent foreign kingdoms and empires, Feist is guilty of pretty much all of it. Considering how deep a hole he dug himself over the course of the series, I think he manages reasonably well with this final volume. It is not a masterwork of epic fantasy by a long shot but compared to much of his recent output he ends the cycle on a positive note. I guess I have read the final volumes in the series mostly because of an odd sense of nostalgia but in a way I'm glad I did finish the series. It's not a series I would recommend to anyone new to the genre these days, it is likely to confirm any preconceptions about Fantasy they might have, but Feist did get me reading again and I'm probably not the only one who started to explore the genre through his books. I suspect a lot of other Fantasy authors owe Feist for the very accessible books we wrote in the 1980s. I would not be surprised if he is responsible for dragging many more readers into the genre. The genre has moved far beyond the type of work Feist has produced and as a reader I think I have developed a taste for more challenging work. Feist was the entry point however, and I think I can forgive him a bunch of mediocre books just for that.

Book Details
Title: Het einde van de magier
Author: Raymond E. Feist
Publisher: Luithingh Fantasy
Pages: 544
Year: 2013
Language: Dutch
Translation: Lia Belt
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-90-245-2892-9
First published: 2013

Voor de poorten van het duister - Raymond E. Feist

Voor de poorten van het duister is the Dutch title of Feist's latest novel. It's a pretty literal translation of the English title At the Gates of Darkness. Feist is some of the first fantasy I've read, there is an entire shelf in my bookcase dedicated to his books. Pretty much from the moment translations of his work started appearing in Dutch bookshops in the late 1990s I've been picking up copies of his work. When I started reading his books I hadn't read much speculative fiction. I think my experience was limited to Dune and The Lord of the Rings prior to reading Magician, which then lead me to the book of people like Robin Hobb and Robert Jordan. Over the years my appreciation of his work has waned somewhat. Partly because I have discovered books that are qualitatively much better and partly because I have developed my taste as a reader of fantasy. I do have fond memories of the first dozen book however, so every time a new one hits the shelves I find myself reading it against my better judgement.

At the Gates of Darkness continues the story that began in Rides a Dread Legion and chronicles the efforts of Pug and his Conclave of Shadows to deal with the threat of an invasion by an army of Demons. The story has three main story lines. One that follows Pug and the Conclave, one that follows the Knight-Adamant Sandreena and one that follows the elven brothers Laromendis and Gulamendis. Each of then unveils useful information about the nature of the threat posed by the invading demons and the role of the Conclave's nemesis Belasco plays in all this. After pooling their resources a plan is conceived to deal with Belasco once and for all.

Feist's work covers a total of five riftwars. The Riftwar, the Serpentwar, the Darkwar, the Demonwar and the yet to be published Chaoswar. At the Gate of Darkness is the conclusion of the Demonwar and Feist's 26th novel in the Midkemia/Kelewan setting. The Dutch translations switched publisher a couple of books ago and Lia Belt, who has translated this book, is the fourth translator to take on Feist's work. The translators decided to change the names of some characters (although not consistently throughout the series), which makes reviewing these book in English a bit of a pain. I constantly have to check if the names are the same in English. Pug for example, is Puc in the Dutch version. A wise decision on the translator's part. With the Dutch pronunciation of the letter g, his name would sound like you have something stuck in your throat.

With such a long running series a certain fatigue of this particular creation is always a risk. Feist's books seem to suffer from this a lot. Personally I think the last good book he wrote was the third book in the Serpentwar Saga, Rage of a Demon King. I consider the fourth part in that sub-series, Shards of a Broken Crown to be mostly superfluous. After that Feist seems to loose interest in his own creation. The books start to feel rushed. Less attention is paid to the setting and the development of societies of Midkemia or to the secondary characters. The plot follows the course of a fairly simple Dungeons and Dragons game. After reading the Darkwar books I was optimistic that Feist was trying to raise the level again. Although these books suffer form many of the problems I just mentioned, they feel more inspired than the books that preceded them. I'm afraid the Demonwar books are not cause for further optimism.

Feist's books have always had a high D&D content. This is not surprising given the fact that Midkemia was originally a D&D world. In earlier books, Feist takes a lot more time to flesh out his world however. With characters such as Arutha and Eric von Darkmoor, these books have a connection to the world of ordinary Midkemian citizens. No matter how privileged these men were, they did not possess magic or extraordinary long lifespans. How they dealt with the presence of magical threats to their country was one of the interesting aspects of the story. A combination of worldly concerns and supernatural influence on the world made these books a lot more readable than the later ones. At the Gate of Darkness is almost completely focussed on the cosmic struggle between the forces of good and evil. There is barely a glance at how the arrival of yet another elven tribe will impact Midkemia, very little on how Puc deals with the loss of much of his second family, next to nothing on the politics of the Kingdom of the Isles look like these days etc. Midkemia has been relegated to a battlefield and a useful pool of magical talent, with much of the struggle completely detached from whatever world it is taking place on.

The Demonwar itself is also a rather confusing affair. Over the course of the series Feist has added layer upon layer of knowledge about the structure of the Midkemian universe. It has become quite a complex structure but as usual, we find out that our view of it is still not complete. The Demons stem from another plain of existence referred to as the fifth circle. They've shown up on previous occasions (in the Serpentwar in particular they play an important part) but their nature and the forces that are driving them to enter the Midkemian plane of existence are still largely unknown. In a duology that aims to explore the conflict between the Conclave of Shadows and the Demons one would expect a little more detail to be introduced. Know thy enemy and all that. Feist does add some more detail, he hints that the fifth circle is not the chaotic environment Puc and his companions always assumed. That's all it is though. A hint. Before we've even begun to unravel what the door is actually about Puc rushes off to some remote location an slams the door (or rift if you prefer) before it is good and well opened. Game over.

Although the books of Feist have never been at the high end of the scale when it comes to literary quality, his early work was first step into the fantasy genre for me. His novels gave me a taste of fantasy before tackling the heavy-hitters of speculative fiction. At the Gates of Darkness however, is nowhere near Feist's best. The story is more or less what we've come to expect from him but the execution is sloppy and feels rushed. From the Demonwar books I really get the impression Feist can't wait to get to the end of this series. With three more books to go, assuming Feist will not write the two additional Krondor books, I certainly hope he does better in the Chaoswar trilogy. It would be a shame to let the series fizzle out in a number of uninspired novels.

Book Details
Title: Voor de poorten van het duister
Author: Raymond E. Feist
Publisher: Luithingh Fantasy
Pages: 336
Year: 2010
Language: Dutch
Translation: Lia Belt
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-90-245-2889-9
First published: 2010