R. Scott Bakker

Despite a promising beginning, this series botched the characters, plot, and story structure so badly that it isn't worth reading. Whether you're looking for good writing and deeper meaning or just an entertaining fantasy story, you'll find neither here.

Let's start with story structure: despite ostensibly being a series, none of the three books here stand by themselves, instead each abruptly ends and then immediately starts up again in the next volume. Thus, The Prince of Nothing is a single show more book divided into three parts. Even taking this view, however, The Prince of Nothing is still an unsatisfying story because there is no resolution to speak of. Bakker proves incapable of writing a beginning, middle, and end even when given over 1,800 pages to do so. Instead, this whole series feels like one big prologue to whatever book set in this world he writes next.

Considering the pure tonnage of writing here you would expect the world to be fleshed out, since that's the only thing this massive tome actually seems to try to accomplish. Instead the world is strangely muddled, as Bakker chooses to hide elements of the world from the reader for no sufficiently good reason. There is, for instance, a chronicle of an event known as the First Apocalypse that is widely known in this fictional world, even by characters that can't read the chronicle itself. Thus, every character in the book knows the full saga, but instead of Bakker allowing the reader to know about these events as well, he gives a trickle of information that never edifies. When a writer keeps the reader ignorant in a way that a character is also ignorant then that can create sympathy. When a writer keeps the reader ignorant where all the characters are in-the-know, at best it's an unnecessary irritation and at worst it creates a hole in the world building. Apparently Bakker doesn't realize this. He also keeps the reader in the dark for a huge number of pages concerning the magic system on this world, though that seemingly stems as much from his own lack of understanding of the system as it does his desire to give the reader only scraps of information.

Moving on to the plot: there are machinations between characters here, but the main plot is a fantasy take on the Crusades, where a Holy War is launched by the fantasy Christians to retake the land occupied by the fantasy Muslims. Hundreds upon hundreds of pages are devoted to depictions of the battles of the Holy War and the trials and tribulations of the army. The problem is, none of the main characters of this novel care about the war at all. They use the war for their own interests, or follow it as part of an unrelated mission, and have no personal investment as to whether it succeeds or fails. The lone character who genuinely believes in the Holy War is a character named Proyas, a second-tier character who is fleshed out little. Thus, for the hundreds of pages of battles it's impossible to care if the army takes that city or fights off that cavalry charge or if troop morale is low or high. What was Bakker thinking, making every major character care about revenge, power, control, knowledge, love, every conceivable motivation except for the one motivation of faith that actually would drive a Holy War? Thus, all the battles are mere background to the different plots of the characters.

This flaw is magnified by the fact that we learn early on that this whole war between the fantasy Christians and fantasy Muslims isn't important, because the battle between good and evil is right around the corner. The passages where dreams explore the First Apocalypse are actually interesting, and have stakes, compared to the Holy War where it seems of little import who wins or who loses- the real battle is up ahead. The fact that the real battle is never reached (is never even begun) further emphasizes the prologue nature of this series.

When the final volume "explains" the Holy War, it makes very little sense (if I'm understanding it correctly the idea was that it would allow for the world to be unified against the great evil that will soon emerge. How exactly does the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people based on religious and ethnic differences lead to unity?). The main overarching plot is a huge mistake on Bakker's part.

Finally, on to the biggest flaw of this book, the characters. Specifically one character, Kellhus. Kellhus is at first presented as preternaturally good at manipulating people. Fine, though I think it strange that Bakker identifies homeschooling as the path to extreme social competence. But then it's revealed that he's also the most amazing fighter ever, capable of beating the best warrior in the world in single combat having only suffered one blow. Later on someone mentions that the only thing he lacks is the ability to use magic. Then it's discovered that he is one of the very, very few who can use magic, and he's the best ever at it. He's also an incredibly quick learner of everything, and even designs some siege weapons that makes everyone's jaw drop, because why not? In short, Kellhus suffers from superman syndrome, being so good at everything that he's unsympathetic, there's no dramatic tension to anything he does, and in general he's not so much a character as he is a plot robot.

I don't mean to suggest that Kellhus would be a better character if he had fewer strengths, though, since as soon as Bakker granted Kellhus the ability to manipulate people this whole character was hopeless. An author has certain limitations on what characteristics he can write, and those limitations are based on the author's own characteristics. Thus, if an author isn't smart, that author won't be able to write very smart characters. He can write characters that are quicker with a comeback, or who know a lot about a topic, because for the former the author can take time writing something that he or she wouldn't be able to think of on the spur of the moment, and for the latter the author can do research and put that in the character's mouth. How smart a character is, though, is limited by how smart the author is, since if an author were able to successfully answer the question "hmm, what would someone smarter than me do?" then that author would be the smarter person. That's not a loop that happens. In this case, the relevant limitation is that an author can't believably write a character who can understand and manipulate people better than the author can. Bakker is clearly no savant at manipulating people: the chapters showcasing Kellhus's mastery over others are thoroughly unconvincing, the theoretical underpinnings of that mastery are laughable as well. Instead we have a character mentioning bland "truths" about people and then those people begin licking that character's boots. It reminded me a bit of Ayn Rand, who populated her books with selfish lazy parasites to make the characters espousing her philosophy look better by comparison. Here we have a world populated by easily manipulated idiots in order to try to convince us that Kellhus is truly a master manipulator (and thus that Bakker can convincingly write such manipulation and understanding). Because of this the character that serves as the keystone of this narrative is not written believably or interestingly. It makes the book a mess.

This book raised my hopes in the beginning, depicting a dying world filled with monumental ruins of ages past, populated by strange creatures and a few humans struggling to survive. Then it turned into generic fantasy stuff, even including the cliche of a game with unexplained rules that symbolizes whatever the author needs it to. Then it turned into below average fantasy as the character of Kellhus gained more prominence. When it became clear that this book was going to focus on a war that no one cared about, while hiding some of the only interesting parts of the world, that it would blatantly serve as a prologue and not a complete book, and that it would take 1,800 pages to do it, it was revealed as yet another crappy fantasy series. Don't let the opening chapters fool you, this book is a waste of time. show less

This review applies to all three volumes of Bakker's 'The Prince of Nothing' series. First off, let me say that I'm really impressed with what Bakker achieved here. I'm reminded of something Guy Kay said when asked why he wrote The Fionavar Tapestry about wanting to prove that there was still life in the old tropes of high fantasy, as designed by Tolkien, and that new things could be done with them as opposed to mere slavish imitation. I think Bakker succeeded admirably in this (whereas Guy show more Kay's actual creation of something really new, in Fionavar at least, is debatable).

From the explanation of the Elves' immortality, as well as a really interesting extrapolation of what that would mean for a contigent being, to the depiction of evil so utterly repulsive and frightening that it makes Melkor and Sauron look like Sunday school teachers this series really played with the traditional high fantasy motifs in ways I found very intriguing. Add to that a magic system based on principles from the epistomology of different schools of philosophy and a cast of characters whose flaws make them almost painfully real to the reader and you'd expect to get a smash hit on your hands. Except that doesn't really seem to have happened and I think I know why.

In a nutshell the books, and the world they present, are just so unambiguosuly dark that I think few readers have the stomach to follow Bakker where he wants to lead them. The most redeeming character of the series, the downtrodden wizard Drusus Achamian, is ultimately a loser who seems only to be a relative good-guy in that he's too feckless to be effectively out for himself. Anasûrimbor Kellhus, the character who would be the titular hero of the series as written by anyone else, is more akin to a natural force than a man and the utter vacuity of his moral centre is so frightening that it makes him both more and less human than any other character of the novel. Cnaiür urs Skiötha, another incredibly well-drawn and fascinating character, is also so driven by his broken nature that while what he is capable of is impressive, it certainly isn't anything the reader is likely to relate to. Bakker obviously has a point to make in his story about human nature, and even the nature of reality, but it certainly isn't a point that is likely to sit well with too many readers unless they like their world view leavened with a heaping portion of nihilism. One begins to wonder, as we learn more about this world and the sleeping great evil that is apparently looming on the horizon, why anyone would bother trying to save such an utterly flawed universe anyway. Despite all of this, though, the world as Bakker paints it is an incredibly vivid and interesting one. The hints of 'what has gone before' that are dropped in the story give real texture to this place and the mysteries still left unanswered are as tantalising as those for which we do receive some explanation. It is really fascinating to see how someone using similar tropes and building blocks to Tolkien could have built something so completely different, and yet still so compelling.

The story itself follows the rise of a great crusade between warring nations against the backdrop of the rise to power of an ancient force of evil which most of the world does not even believe in anymore. Behind and within this backdrop are woven the tales of the three main characters (Achaimian, Kellhus, and Cnaiur) as they each pursue their own goals and are inextricably led to one another. The climax of the series could be considered something of an anti-climax, for while each of the characters has, in some sense, found what they were seeking and begun upon a new path, the much larger movements of the story (both the crusade and the rise of sleeping evil) are left in media res for another series to pick up on. Bakker has now released two books in this continuation of the larger story, but many readers may find it frustrating that so much of what could be considered the overarching plot of the novels is left completely hanging by the end of volume three.

Overall I was torn by this series. One the one hand I think Bakker did a commendable job in building a world that did truly new things with the high fantasy genre and I was always fascinated by each new mystery he revealed; on the other hand I ended up feeling like I needed a shower after reading these books. The evil in it is presented so convincingly, and the very nature of the world he created is so bleak, that I just don't relish the thought of visiting the place again. Add to that the fact that the term "sympathetic character" doesn't seem to be in Bakker's vocabulary and you are left with a series that is definitely tailored to the tastes of the minority...but then again, maybe that's a good thing. show less

Bakker continues his epic fantasy filled with astonishingly reflective characters, many of whom can somehow spend half a page on introspection between every other line of dialogue without it ever feeling anything but gripping and exciting to read. The titular ice-cold logician monk continues to both chill and impress me, the tortured wandering sorcerer breaks my heart over and over, the brilliant barbarian chieftain's internal war of pride and self-loathing reaches new heights, and the show more political machinations are both believable and complex while (somehow) never really taking up all that much space in the narrative. Meanwhile, the Holy War that is the framework of it all marches on, horrifically brutal and genuine in its depiction. I've no idea how the final volume could possibly deliver on the promise of this, which somehow takes every great element in the first novel and builds them to new staggering levels, but I'm really looking forward to finding out. show less

In many ways this conclusion to The Prince of Nothing is stunningly good, brilliantly imaginative in a way that brings to mind Steven Erikson. Bakker's brutally compelling world that is fresh, surprising, consistent, and deep. His descriptive language is nothing less than astonishing. His ability to capture the epic pageantry of battle is superb. And he makes you feel the tormented questioning of his characters.

And yet this is military fantasy that frequently fumbles its strategy, tactics, show more and logistics. I found myself constantly frustrated by a sense that battles simply wouldn't be fought this way, and campaigns wouldn't be run this way, and armies couldn't be supplied this way. Which isn't to deny that these battles are beautifully described, and clearly take the plot where Bakker wants it to go.

By the halfway point of this third book of the series I was finding it hard to find sympathy for any of the admittedly interesting cast of characters. Kellhus' ability to read and manipulate even the best of normal men and women is both logical and organic within the story, but at times it just seemed too easy. Fortunately things picked up in the last 150 pages or so, and the book certainly finished with a sustained bang. Overall, a very impressive, if in some ways flawed, debut trilogy from Bakker. show less