A lot of people think of Parker’s SF as a stuffy, pompous, pastime of snobs and elitist. They couldn't be more wrong. It is massively popular among all classes in SF fandom and if you just “listen” to the music of the human condition, you will probably want more. Sure, someone might go mad, commit suicide in a number of ways, burned to death of in some manner or other and dies. Sometimes things do work out and villains get what is coming to them and lovers prevail (sometimes). Parker’s fiction is bigger than life and so satisfying and full of everything that makes me want to believe there’s still hope for contemporary SF.

Anybody can impersonate Elvis, that’s the thing. There are many Elvis impersonators, but only one Pavarotti (aka Parker). Try “The Belly of the Bow”, since it lacks the cheesy stage farce qualities of the latest Brett (“The Desert Prince”), or the bizarre pantomime meets mysticism, with lashings of stupid script of “The Firstborn Trilogy”.

I used to feel just a bit lukewarm about contemporary SF, snootily affecting to prefer the vintage kind. That was years ago. Now, I don't think I could read, say, Goodkind’s ''Soul of the Fire” without requiring periodic massage for the sacro-lumbar area. Fortunately we still have Parker who gets on with it, writes above-average SF, as opposed to most of the crap's tedious rambling SF prose of contemporary SF. Hats off to Parker for being able to write characters that we care about (even when they do things out of character as we all do sometimes) . His characters are real people, instead of gods and goblins and wizards (even the so-called “wizards” feel like real people).

If you want to know what “The Principle” is you’ll probably have to wait for the 3rd volume… ( )

Luckily I came to this after reading almost all of the rest of KJ Parker's works. This one goes nowhere and is brutal without purpose. Because I'm a completionist I'll give the next one a shot but you are better off skipping this trilogy based to avoid reading this one, IMHO ( )

Definitely a second act book. ( )

Wow! What a kick at the end! I had to say, I thought Bardas had taken the disappointment and second self imposed exile from his home rather mildly, until that twist at the end...
I am not sure about the "magic" used in the book, but I think that is the point... ( )

okaaay. That was kind of disturbing. ( )