Michael Moorcock

This is the first in the Count Brass series, but follows the previous series about the Runestaff. I read that many years ago and no longer have it, so it's just as well that this begins with a summary and drops in various other aspects of the back story as the book goes on.

Duke Dorian Hawkmoon is enjoying a quiet life ruling the Kamarg, a marshy area with its own unique wildlife such as horned horses (and based on the real-life area of France, known as the Camargue). The setting is an alternative Europe, seemingly in the far future after a period where a technological society - possibly ours - collapsed. Five years before the story begins, Hawkmoon and his friends were instrumental in overthrowing a tyrannical regime known as the Dark Empire, based on a reborn technology and operating from their version of Great Britain. The rulers of the regime supposedly all perished at the Battle of Londra (London) or just before, yet Dorian's tranquil existence, married to the daughter of Count Brass (who also died in the battle), and enjoying family life with her and their son and daughter, begins to be blighted when local people start to eye him with disapproval.

He discovers that rumour is rife that the ghost of Count Brass is out in the marshes at night telling passersby that Dorian betrayed him and led him to his death. Determined to quash this, he rides out to meet the apparent imposter, but discovers things are not that simple. This man is a younger version of the Count, and soon he brings younger versions of Dorian's other close friends to meet him, who also died in the struggle against Granbretan. They have been brought there by someone they term the oracle, who has told them they are in a netherworld - for them, it is endless night - but that they will be restored to their former lives if they kill Dorian who otherwise will lead them all to their deaths. Luckily, he persuades them to doubt the oracle, and when the creature reappears in a strange pyramidal device which can appear and disappear, it transpires he is one of the supposedly deceased ex-rulers of the former Dark Empire. Dorian and the others set out on an epic journey to find out what is going on and why this man is having to work through intermediaries to kill him. The answers when they come lead to heartbreak for Dorian.

This is a short page-turning read, not a profound story, but colourful and with a zany cast of characters including a villain who wears a mask with a working and chiming clock in it. The ending is the best part, as Dorian truly pays a terrible price and yet is left wondering whether the past he remembers is real or imaginary.… (more)

In this final volume in the Chronicles of Castle Brass, Dorian and his wife Yisselda have returned to Castle Brass where a month or so has passed. Yisselda's father, Count Brass, is still finding it hard to believe that his two grandchildren really existed, although he has accepted the return of his daughter who was believed killed at the battle of Londra, five years previously. Both Dorian and Yisselda pine for their children and decide to visit Queen Flana in Londra, in case her scientists can help them in their quest to find the children.

They set off, but when they reach the Silver Bridge which joins their version of Calais to the coast of Granbretan, as it is known in this dimension, Dorian is snatched into another existence where he is confronted by a strange and threatening being. He falls into the sea, but is rescued by Jhary-a-Conel, one of the incarnations of the Companion to the Eternal Champion (as he is an incarnation of the Champion himself). Jhary rows him to the shore of a misty, seemingly deserted, land. They are accosted by the menacing being who abducted Dorian, whose ramblings don't make much sense. Afterwards, they find a group of people they recognise, who have been brought from different realities to advise them, and on their directive, return to the shore where a mysterious ship arrives.

On the ship are warriors taken from different realities, and two other incarnations of the Eternal Champion, Erekose and Corum. Soon afterwards, a third is taken onboard: Elric of Melnibone. The mysterious blind Captain tells them their mission: the Conjunction of the Million Spheres is about to take place when the whole multiverse is subject to change, and this has allowed the intrusion of two powerful sorcerors from a different reality who intend to suck all the energy out of the multiverse and kill everything. They must somehow kill them and burn the building in which they reside, in the ruins of Tanelorn the fabled city which both Dorian and Erekose have been seeking: Dorian, because he hopes his lost children are there, and Erekose because his wife whom he has been trying to find for aeons, might be there.

I won't say any more about the plot at this point only than to say that, in effect, the book has two climaxes, as the final third concerns events of even greater momentum for not only the hundreds of incarnations of the Champion, but also the multiverse itself, and provides an explanation for, among other things, the precise nature of the Black Sword which Elric and other heroes have carried, and the Black Jewel which Hawkmoon once had forcibly inserted into his head to control him (in the previous Runestaff books).

In one sense, this book provides a wrapping up of the whole saga of connected stories about Hawkmoon, Erekose, Elric and Corum, though I believe some aspects of it are revisited in other books written later, such as The Sailor on the Seas of Fate in the Elric series which I have yet to re-read.

The aspect which figured more strongly in the previous books in this trilogy, but is lost here, is characterisation. There are a lot of minor characters - the other soldiers aboard the ship who help the four Champions, for a start - and characters who have appeared in other series which I read too long ago to recall, such as Orland Fank, servant of the Runestaff - and none of them are more than ciphers. The important thing in this book is the concept of the multiverse, the nature of gods, whether there should be an imposed balance between order and chaos, and the nature of humanity and whether we create our own gods and can dispense with them as easily, and can create our own paradise. So there is quite a strong philosophical component driving the narrative, rather than straightforward action as in the previous volumes. It was interesting, but also rather mind-boggling at times.… (more)

A survey of epic fantasy through the lenses of the author's biases, stated in various places. He is scathing about the Inklings: Tolkien, C S Lewis and Charles Williams. One of the things he dislikes about Tolkien is the latter's supposedly small minded environmental concerns and yet this is one of the aspects that probably appeals the most to modern readers given the ongoing loss of habitat and biodiversity. He views them as Oxford snobs. As someone who obsessively re-read Lewis ' Narnia series as a child, despite being working class myself, that all went over my head at the time and I just enjoyed the stories and characters. I've yet to re-read them but doubt I'll develop the antipathy towards them that the author demonstrates.

He highly rates the late Fitz Leiber, as do I, having discovered his work when at high school, and he points out the male dominated nature of the genre and the good work being done by women at the time of publication (my copy is the first edition). But a singular omission in his discussion of women fantasy writers of the period is Tanith Lee who was very prolific at the time although her early work was published in the States since she couldn't get UK publishers interested. I found it odd - she wasn't even mentioned in passing, unlike Katherine Kurtz who at least had her surname included, though frustratingly nothing more. Another odd omission is that despite discussing some of the work of André Norton, he fails to even mention her Witch World series, her biggest contribution to the genre.

A lot of the book consists of quotes from various works but with not much critical input. He also states up front that he has excluded his own writing so anyone hoping for insights into the development of the Eternal Champion canon will be disappointed. Given the uneven nature of the book, for me it rates an OK 2 stars… (more)