The Spell Sword was a bit strange for me because all of the Darkovan novels I've read previously (the Renunciates books, plus Stormqueen!, Hawkmistress! and Darkover Landfall) have focused on women as central characters. The Spell Sword has two viewpoint characters, and they're both men. This book also has less of a feminist focus: the plot is more about defeating an external enemy than the developing strengths of the characters, which in Bradley's work (that I've read) tends to involve fighting institutional sexism.

I was intrigued by the female characters, who are twins and end up romantically involved with the male leads. It's easy to see why this particular plot wouldn't allow them to be the viewpoint characters, and I liked the romance, but I would have liked a deeper characterization of these two women much better.

The Spell Sword took a while to pick up (as is the case with most of Bradley's novels). Earthman Andrew Carr receives a telepathic distress call from a young Keeper named Callista Lanart and, affected by her in a way that his many previous lovers did not, requests a permanent assignment on Cottman IV/Darkover to the mapping section, only to be the sole survivor when the mapping plane crashes during a fierce winter storm in the Hellers (a mountain range noted for its nasty weather). Meanwhile, reluctant near-Keeper Damon Ridenow (who was hopelessly in love with the Keeper who trained him, the "unattractive," middle-aged Leonie Hastur), en route to a kinswoman's castle, loses all of his escort party to invisible foes who prove to be catmen (rendered here as "cat-men;" in Rediscovery, co-written with Mercedes Lackey, they were called "catmen"). Arriving at the Alton Domain, he discovers his kinswoman, twenty-year-old Ellemir Lanart, distraught over the abduction of her twin sister, the Keeper Callista; Ellemir is even more distraught over the fact that she cannot telepathically contact her.

As one might expect, Andrew Carr survives thanks to Callista's telepathic urgings, and eventually makes his way to the Alton Domain, where his claims to have had visions and mental conversations with the spitting image of Ellemir are grudgingly believed when Damon is able to ascertain that the Terranen does indeed have laran, or psychic powers. When the Alton lord, Dom Esteban, returns with the remnants of his expedition after a successful engagement with invisible cat-men, Damon is able to construct a plan to rescue Callista from "the darkening lands" that have fallen under the sway of the laran of the cat-men. As Dom Esteban, though in his sixties still the doughtiest warrior and greatest swordsman of the Domains, has been paralyzed from the waist down, he has to resort to his laran -- the Alton Gift, whereby he may dominate another man's thoughts and movements -- to impart to the scholarly Damon his own wondrous swordsmanship. Hence the "spell sword" of the title: Dom Esteban's sword has a first-level matrix ("starstone") in its basket hilt which facilitates his taking over the reflexes and voluntary movements of whoever holds it.

The Spell Sword was OK; though a very short novel, the dense type and Bradley's uneven writing made it feel like it was at least a hundred pages longer. I have to admit that I liked it enough, despite her usual flaws (and despite the fact that Callista was a particularly pallid Ophelia, always weeping and on the verge of collapse; sure, she was under a deal of strain, but come on!), to want to read the next Darkover book (chronologically speaking), The Forbidden Tower, in the near future. ( )