Abraham, Daniel: The Dragon's Path
The Dragon's Path (2011)
Written by: Daniel Abraham
Genre: Epic Fantasy
Pages: 576 (Trade Paperback)
Series: Book One (The Dagger and The Coin)
Why I Read It: Daniel Abraham won me over with his The Long Price Quartet, and really got my attention with his urban fantasy series, The Black Sun's Daughter, written under the name M.L.N. Hanover. There was no question that I'd pick up his latest fantasy when it came out last year, but when I got it, it was so big (I know…. that's what she said….) that I just stuck it in the TBR and waited for an excuse to read it. The excuse came with Mount TBR, vacation, and having a free copy attached to my Kindle version of Leviathan Wakes. Let's see how Abraham's latest fantasy compares to all the other stuff I love by him.
The premise: ganked from BN.com: All paths lead to war...
Marcus' hero days are behind him. He knows too well that even the smallest war still means somebody's death. When his men are impressed into a doomed army, staying out of a battle he wants no part of requires some unorthodox steps.
Cithrin is an orphan, ward of a banking house. Her job is to smuggle a nation's wealth across a war zone, hiding the gold from both sides. She knows the secret life of commerce like a second language, but the strategies of trade will not defend her from swords.
Geder, sole scion of a noble house, has more interest in philosophy than in swordplay. A poor excuse for a soldier, he is a pawn in these games. No one can predict what he will become.
Falling pebbles can start a landslide. A spat between the Free Cities and the Severed Throne is spiraling out of control. A new player rises from the depths of history, fanning the flames that will sweep the entire region onto The Dragon's Path--the path to war.
Spoilers, yay or nay?: Yay. While there's not a whole lot to spoil in this book, despite the length, what I do spoil is major. To stay safe, just skip to "My Rating" and you'll be fine. Everyone else, onward!
This book was difficult to read. And that's a shame, because the difficulty of it took me by total surprise given that I've torn through Abraham's debut fantasy series, his co-authored space opera, and his pseudonymed urban fantasy. Ironically, when Leviathan Wakes and The Dragon's Path were released last year, I figured of the two, the SF would be the one to turn me off, since it was co-authored. Talk about being wrong.
At first, The Dragon's Path wasn't bad. I was compelled by the little details in the prologue, fascinated by the bit of magic that's revealed. And the first few chapters also held my attention for the world-building. Yes, this series is Abraham's take on epic fantasy, so there's a lot of nods and tributes to other authors (I picked up on quite a few nods to George R.R. Martin and the nod to Gandalf facing off the Balrog nearly made me laugh), but the little details that fleshed out this world were fascinating.
I've got the trade paperback copy of this book. I also have the Kindle version, which came free with Leviathan Wakes. I started reading the Kindle version, because I was going on vacation and that was easier than lugging a big book around. However, I found myself utterly impatient with the Kindle version, and that's because the progress meter was so damn slow.
But that's not the progress meter's fault. After all, I got two books for the price of one, but when I read Leviathan Wakes, I was sucked in immediately and had a hard time putting the Kindle down. Sure, the progress meter moved slow there too, but I was able to figure out my real percentage easy enough: just take the progress and divide by 2, and there you go. But it really wasn't necessary, because I was so engaged by Corey's debut.
Not the case here. For starters, my trick of dividing the progress by two wouldn't work, because the book started at 58% or something. Also, the book is slow.
Really slow.
So slow that when I got home, I put the Kindle aside, grabbed my trade paperback, and finished the book there.
And I'll be honest: if I wasn't already a fangirl of Abraham's work, I wouldn't have finished.
Maybe it was me, but it took me a LONG time to link the prologue to the current action of the story, and when I finally did, I was rather puzzled that the link was Master Kit, who frankly is the best character in the book by nature of his goodness. All of the other characters? Inevitably do something that makes you dislike them. Except Wester. He really didn't do anything but sit and glower and suffer in silence. But Geder burned a city alive, Dawson wants to keep the regal hierarchy and own slaves to boot, and Cithrin steals money from the bank, sleeps with a man in order to betray him, and then turns into a sodding drunk. At one point, while admiring that Abraham had the balls to write a book featuring practically nothing but unlikeable characters, I was rather flabbergasted. What's the point of this? I know that Abraham is twisting our expectations when it comes to fantasy, asking us to challenge what we hold dear about the genre, and that's fine.
But if unlikeable characters aren't enough, you had the snail's pace of a plot. Really, barely anything happens, and when the progress meter is barely moving on your Kindle, it's painful. Really painful. And then I asked myself if my reaction was more against this being more political/banking fantasy than action, but really… no. I get through Martin just fine, and follow it just fine too. Same with Carey and Rothfuss, and all of these authors have their moments of glory where I want to worship their pages and they all have moments of get on with it already. So it's not that I'm reading something that isn't to my taste. It's just that this book is slowly but surely building itself up for something far, far bigger, something the end just barely scrapes the surface of.
And it's not to say that events of this book weren't interesting. Medieval banking? Random, but interesting. The theatre troop? I loved them. While the world-building felt epic fantasy-generic in some places, in others, I was utterly captivated. Everything about the apostate, his magic, the Goddess, and the difference between truth and lies? I can't wait to see how that plays out. Geder's discovery of the Spider Goddess, and the trek it took to get there? Really cool. Obviously, what he did in Vanai was horrifying, but watching him get manipulated has been fascinating. And Clara. While I despise her husband's belief system, she rocks. She's no idle wife.
I felt a lot better when I switched to the trade paperback. Despite the length, it was great to SEE the progress, and the print's so large (not oversized) that it's easy on my eyes. That's not to say my earlier troubles are moot, but they were easier to deal with when I was physically turning the pages.
That being said, if I were to introduce someone to Abraham's fiction, this would not be it.
My Rating: It's a Gamble
Abraham's obviously playing with the epic fantasy genre, playing into some expectations, nodding to past giants, while also twisting things this way and that. And I'll admit that I'm curious to see what the next book is about: given that The Dragon's Path was nothing but 567 pages of set-up, I'd like a little payoff, you know? But I would not recommend fantasy nor Abraham newbies to start with this book. I've read nearly every novel Abraham has written, and this is by far my least favorite. That doesn't mean there's not interesting things happening in the narrative. There's definitely some compelling world-building. But it's an utterly slow read with characters who are more unlikable than not and the plot provides very little payoff. You have to be a real fan of Abraham's work (meaning, you'd better have the The Long Price under your belt at the very LEAST) before you tackle this, otherwise you may not want to try something of his ever again. I know I wouldn't have been impressed if I didn't already love his series: The Long Price Quartet, The Black Sun's Daughter, and The Expanse. So I read this at the right time, and after a bit of juggling, decided that reading the trade paperback was preferable to the Kindle version (which bundles this and Leviathan Wakes). So if you want to try Abraham, don't start here. I'm plan on reading the sequel, but it's a low priority for me right now.
Cover Commentary: I'm rather meh about this cover. On one hand, I kind of like it: it's simple and straight-forward and clearly fantasy. On the other hand, it makes the book seem so much more dramatic than it really is. It also, for reasons probably belonging to the sword that's so prominently featured on the cover, made me think this fantasy would be more swords-and-sorcery than anything else, which this book isn't. The series might reveal itself as such, but this book didn't.
Next up: Endgame by Ann Aguirre