Honestly, this book was really slow going at first. I think it's about a third of the way through the book that things actually start to happen. That doesn't matter, though, because the main character is empathetic, charming, and behaves like an actual person. He doesn't do things because it's heroic, he does them because they're the things he thinks he needs to do. It's a fine distinction.Once the book gets going, you'll probably have difficulty putting it down. One of the best fantasy novels I've read. ( )

The best of Bujold's outstanding body of work. Cazaril is 'Miles grown up'; Chalion is a realistically detailed country reminiscent of medieval Spain; the religious context is intriguing, and the doctrinal concept that Caz 'volunteered for his assignment' is sound. ( )

This book is part of my effort to read all joint Hugo/Nebula Award winners. While this particular novel did not win the awards, it’s sequel, “Palladin of Souls” did. I thought it best to read part one before taking on part two.

That having been said, I’m not sure I’ll proceed to “Palladin”. This genre, medieval fantasy, is not my favorite. While I thoroughly enjoyed J. R. R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire (at least the first three installments), I found this to be far less effective. The setting of “Curse” is the Spanish medieval kingdom of Chalion. Many of the characters, titles and place names are heavily influenced by the supposed Spanish setting, which I found only slightly confusing. More troublesome is the complete absence of any kind of map. Whenever an author creates a world and frequently refers to geographic settings and various competing principalities and kingdoms, how can you fail to include a map?

Again, making allowances for my general aversion to fantasy, this book was preferable to other works of fantasy which include magicians, elves, dwarves and dragons, in a cheap ripoff of Middle Earth. There is heavy emphasis on religion and spirituality, and a backdrop of magic that doesn’t consume the story until a sequence near the end that just gets silly.

All in all, probably a winner for medieval fantasy wonks, though as stated, I’ve read better in the genre. I suspect I’ll proceed to “Palladin”, but more so from an obsessive compulsive desire to cross it off the Hugo/Nebula list than for any great need to see this story through. ( )

Just finished listening to the audio book version - it was brilliant. Its great to have a fantasy story that has little or no comparisons to Lord of the Rings. The characters were well developed and kept developing throughout the story. The story itself was simple, but had complexities built-in and the world was explained very well. Lots of unexpected twists and turns. I've found a new fantasy author who also does Sci-fi - so I'm doubly blessed. ( )

This book has a lot of important characters, so it kept me on the fly most of the time, making me think... who is that.. flip back a few pages. the dy in front of every name is confusing. The plot was amazing though and enough to keep me interested and yearn for more. I like that the main character is not perfect, far from dastardly gorgeous and aging. It was a nice point of view and there was so much going on that I had to keep reading. ( )